


A Grand Mistake

by DarknessAroundUs



Series: A Written Life [1]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Bisexual Betty Cooper, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Graduate School, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, PI Betty Cooper, Slow Burn, Writer Betty Cooper, Writer Jughead Jones, frank sexual disscusion, promiscuous Jughead Jones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-11
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-10-08 09:58:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 44,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17384348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarknessAroundUs/pseuds/DarknessAroundUs
Summary: Jughead Jones has been waiting his whole life to have his work critiqued by professors and students whose work he admires. Now that he’s in one of the top graduate writing programs in the world, he’s nervous to hear others feedback on his piece.Everyone raves about his manuscript. Everyone but Betty Cooper.An MFA AU.





	1. First Year, First Quarter

**Author's Note:**

> There are lots of stories where either Betty or Jughead are in a Masters of Fine Art (MFA) program but there are not a lot of stories about them both being in the same program, and there are no stories that I know of, that focus on what being in a program like that is like. 
> 
> I have an MFA. I attended a wonderful, competitive program. I really liked the idea of writing a story about the two of them that captures that feel. Reading Show don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld was also an influence on this story. 
> 
> The MFA program Betty and Jughead attend in the story is one I made up, but in the world of this story it is one of the top programs. It is amalgam of the one I attended and one a close friend of mine attended. 
> 
> As far as I know there are no major competitive MFA programs on the quarter system, but this fictional school is on it. The story will be eight chapters. One for each of the quarters they attend and one more for the summer after graduation. 
> 
> The version of Betty and Jughead in this story are a little harder, because they grew up without each other but with many of the same difficult circumstances. This is a slow burn. There is no love at first sight here. But we get there.

On the day before classes start, the graduate program hosts a back to school BBQ. It is the first opportunity for the incoming writing students to meet each other. Betty quickly learns it is also a chance for the second years to boast. 

Betty is eating a terrible veggie burger on the south lawn and talking to two second years, both women, about the program she is about to enter. 

One of the second years is a tall brunette named Jane and the other is a beautiful Japanese American named Leah. Both are in the non-fiction program, just like Betty. However they make it abundantly clear, with every comment that they make, that they are much better than her. 

They have never read Betty’s writing, so they don’t actually know how she stacks up to them in terms of literary poweress, but from their point of view it doesn’t matter. Because she’s still a naive first year and they have already chosen their thesis advisors. 

“In my first year, I actually thought Truman Capote was a good writer. Now of course I know better.” Leah says.

“When I first got here, I was proud that one of my pieces published in my hometown newspaper. Now I wouldn’t mention a publication unless it was somewhere like McSweeny’s or Tinhouse.” Jane declares. 

Betty’s trying to keep a smile on her face, but all she really wants to say is fuck you. She’s not sure if either of them are self aware enough to realize how they sound. 

Maybe if she had gone to graduate school right out of undergrad she would have felt differently. Instead she has three years of ‘real world’ experience as a private investigator under her belt. 

“Have you ever been published before?” Leah asks before swallowing the rest of her cheap, school provided wine. 

Betty feels the urge to tell the truth rush through her, before she shakes her head. 

“How I wish I could start from scratch all over again. The Sun is an ok first publication, but they are just so much better known for their reprints.” Jane gave a sigh. Betty wasn’t sure she if she was being facetious. 

Leah launches into an in-depth rant on what literary journals are legitimately cool, which ones could make your reputation, and which ones could possibly destroy whatever reputation you had developed. 

Betty nods at the appropriate moments but doesn’t pay too much attention to her.

There are other clumps of students gathered nearby. Betty can’t tell just by looking who is a first or second year, but she can get a sense of the larger dynamics at play. There’s at least three people that are already visible-y drunk, and a clump of five students have gone further off to smoke weed under a tree. 

The ratio of women to men is five to one. In most conversational clumps, two or more women have gathered around one man. Just to the left of Betty two polished girls with long hair are both talking up a tall man whose black hair had loose unruly curls. He’s wearing a thin white t-shirt, and tattoos cover both his arms. He has a cigarette in his mouth and grin on his face. 

Betty’s undergrad experience was at NYU which was a pretty even split between female and males, but during her sophomore year she had attended a study abroad program in France. The ratio of men to women there was something like one to seven. Even the nice, laid back stoner guy had ended up being an overly ego’d menace by the end. Ratios like that were good for no man, or woman really. It distorted reality in a fundamental way. 

Not that any of that really mattered to Betty. Outside of Archie and Fred, who were family after all, she was perfectly happy living a man free existence.

“Did you see him?” Leah says to Jane, and Betty focuses on them again.

“The dark mysterious man talking to those two new girls? Of course. We should go talk to him.” Jane says with a wink. Betty notices how the women he is currently talking to are excluded from the narrative. Both women looked at Betty expectantly.

Betty refrains from pointing out that what Jane just said sounds like a line from a bad romance novel. “Go ahead.” Betty says with a nod. “I’m going to get water. It was nice to meet you.” 

Both women smile brightly before heading of in the direction of the man. Betty watches them go before heading towards the water. She can’t help but overhear the man introduce himself as Jughead. 

She ends up hearing about him a lot that evening, even though she doesn’t talk to him directly. After the BBQ is done most of the students head to a local bar called The Corner Pub. 

Betty goes with them. She’s met Kay by then, a beautiful Latina, that is definitely Betty’s type physically. Betty wishes for a moment that she hadn’t sworn of dating during graduate school, but soon they’re talking about their favorite works of true crime, it turns out they are both a little obsessed with Janet Malcolm, and Betty is pleased to discover there is no romantic spark there.

Betty’s on her second beer in three hours, so she’s clear headed, but everyone else around her is somewhere in the range of slightly buzzed to almost entirely wasted. Kay’s on the buzzed end of the spectrum and even she’s being driven slightly nuts by the drunker among them.

Jane stops by briefly and tells Betty all about Jughead. How he was in a gang in highschool. How he actually has a scar up his arm. She also mentions that she’s pretty sure she is taking him home tonight. 

Betty nods and smiles. Twenty minutes later she hears another women tell her friend the same thing. 

After overhearing a long conversation about how bad-ass he is (a phrase Betty has never liked), Kay shakes her head and says “I guess he’s cute. But i’m here to write.”

Betty feels exactly the same way but instead of saying that, she makes plans with Kay to go to coffee tomorrow.

The quarter starts out well. She and Kay fall into an easy friendship, and then Mia another non-fiction student befriends them both. 

Most of the other students clump together in larger groups. At readings in the evenings they all sit together. Sometimes Mia sits with one of the larger groups instead. She makes it clear that Kay and Betty are welcome to join her, but they both always decline. 

Betty’s always been leery of large groups. Still because of Mia she’s in on most of the school gossip. Most of which she wishes she never heard. Because of that she knows things about people she’s never talked to, like the fact that Kevin Keller, the star of the poetry program, just slept with a much older, very famous poet. 

Or the fact that Jughead Jones has now slept with at least a quarter of the female contingent of the writing program, and has still managed to remain friendly with everyone. 

Betty knows that even though she doesn’t really interact with others outside of class, Mia and Kay, she has a bit of a reputation herself. She’s turned down three men and one women, all but one in the program and apparently as a reaction to that, and maybe her general aloofness, she’s got a reputation as being a bit of a bitch. 

When Betty tells Archie this over video chat, he throws his head back in laughter, his mouth wide open. When he finally stops laughing, he quips “So what else isn’t different from high school?” and suddenly Betty is the one laughing uncontrollably. 

It’s hard just to see him over chat, to know he’s so far away in LA. She knows he feels the same way. Archie has always made friends easier than she has, but he’s always struggled making close ones. 

Betty makes sure to facetime Fred once a week too. He always complains about being an empty nest-er and tries to tease her into coming home for the weekend, but twice Betty hears the voice of a women in the background, and so she has reason to hope that he’s found some companionship while she and Archie are gone. Still she promises to come home for Christmas, for both their sakes.

Classes are going well. Betty’s work is different than most of the other students, more research based and less personal, but the professors seem to love it and the feedback she’s received so far is positive.

Her favorite class is Prof. Fog, but she also enjoys the workshop run by Prof. Howe, partially because she’s the only non-Fiction writer in there, and the fiction writers have a different energy that Betty finds engaging. She finds it easier to comment on their pieces because this is probably the only class she will share with them over the two years, so she can be more honest. 

* * * 

 

The way Prof. Howe runs his workshop is this; each week three students submit one chapter each to be workshopped the following week. The chapters are discussed by the class, before being dissected by Prof. Howe himself.

After that if the author of the chapter wishes to clarify something that was discussed they can speak. Finally the students hand notes they’ve typed up about the chapter to the author of it, as well as Prof. Howe.

Jughead’s turn to workshop the first chapter of his memoir/almost novel is on the third week of class.

Not everyone has gone before him, but enough students for Jughead to get a feel for how the workshop actually works. He also has a feel for most of the other students writing styles. He’s not particularly impressed, but that could just be a matter of taste.

Most of his fellow students seem obsessed with minor parental flaws, or quirky family tales. Nothing he finds particularly engaging. But they might feel the same way about his work.

Even though this is technically a fiction workshop most of what is being workshopped is thinly veiled autobiography. Still whenever they talk about the first person narrator they have to call them the speaker, as if they don’t know exactly who it really is, the author hiding behind a slightly different name. 

Jughead can’t judge others on this point, because his work is mostly autobiographical as well, focusing largely on his time in a gang on Chicago’s Southside. It includes a fair amount of stereotypical drug dealing combined with violence. But what sets it apart, he hopes is the writing style, and the fact that he solved a murder and cleared his father’s name (mostly, at least, FP still went to jail for his role in the cover-up).

“Let’s talk about Jughead’s chapter first.” Prof. Howe says. Everyone in the workshop shuffles through the stapled packets of paper in front of them. Jughead exhales anxiously, craving a cigarette, instead he takes a sip of water.

This is the moment of truth. In undergrad he always felt coddled by the teachers and by his fellow students, but this is one of the top MFA programs in the entire country. Sometimes it still feels like a miracle that he even got in. The acceptance rate is less than 1%.

Here, today in this very classroom, he’s sure, one way or another he’ll learn the truth about his writing.

Clair, a mousy second year, is the first person to speak. The language she uses to describe the chapter is what the very best back of book blurbs are made of. At one point Jughead, in spite of himself, blushes.

He expects after her words of praise that someone would dispute at least one of her points. But no one does. Instead Jughead feels a little disoriented by what feels like an avalanche of praise. All of the students who talk about his work say kind things. Although Jughead notices that out of the whole class, Betty Cooper is silent.

He doesn’t interact with Betty much, inside or outside of class. Almost nobody does. Jughead for the first time in his life is part of the popular crowd. All eight to ten of them gather each evening for beers at the pub.

Betty appears to have made two close female friends, both non-fiction students, early on. One of them, Mia is an acquaintance of Jughead. But mostly Betty sticks to herself. Jughead interacts with her every day that it rains, although he’s not sure she notices him. Betty is a runner and Jughead’s on campus job puts him in charge of checking everyone into the gym. When the weather is bad, and only when the weather is bad, Betty runs the track at the gym.

That is how he knows that she loves to run to hip hop (she accidentally flashes the screen of her phone at him while showing him her school ID) and that her favorite color is a soft blue (if her running clothes are any indicator).

Jughead has learned more about her from the gym and from seeing her at readings, than he has from sharing a class with her. During Prof. Howe’s class she has largely remained silent. Introducing herself on the first day as the only non-fiction student in a class full of fiction writers.

Jughead assumes her silence about his piece means nothing, even though he would like her to talk, because he thinks she’s beautiful. He wishes he didn’t, because Betty seems like the only girl in the program who isn’t interested in him, but maybe that is part of what intrigues him about her, apart from her beauty.

Prof. Howe speaks of Jughead’s piece glowingly, he actually uses the phrases “wondrously brutal” and “A gritty tale extraordinarily told”. After that all of the students hand their notes to Jughead.

Jughead has a hard time staying patient through the rest of class. He desperately wants to peek at the notes everyone left on his piece. But instead he fiddles with his Sharpee pen and offers half assed feedback to the next two students they workshop, all the while feeling like he’s floating on air.

The next round of students pass out their work to be workshopped. Betty is among them and Jughead can’t help but feel a bit excited about finally getting to know something about her.  
He rushes out of class, not stopping to talk with anyone. Instead of eating with his normal group of friends, he walks down to the town nearby, and eats alone in the diner. He orders three burgers instead of his normal two as a bit of a reward for himself.

After all those years of self doubt, he actually feels like a writer, like one who might even be leaving this program with a good publishing contract. This feeling is encouraged by Prof. Howe’s notes, which he reads first. Prof. Howe offers to introduce him to an agent. He’s pretty sure not everyone in the program is getting notes like these. Maybe no one.

Next he reads three different student notes, all of them say nothing but good things. He’s on his final burger when he starts to read Betty’s critique of his work. Critique is the right word to use for her feedback, because it is not positive.

To be fair, she writes a number of praise filled lines in the margins and underlines a couple of sentences, adding the word beautiful. But she also corrects his sentence structure and word choice at least once a paragraph.

Those notes he can live with. They don’t even diminish his joy. It’s the final notes that gut him. On the last page she writes:

“Jones’s writing is clear, concise, and the content itself is at points astonishing. But ultimately as engaging as the story should be given the content and the fact that the writing style is very engaging, it does not linger in the mind, nor resonate with the soul. The story, or at least the part that the class has workshopped thus far, lacks emotional depth.

It is difficult to connect with the main character - James when he does not react to any situation emotionally. There is a great story here, and in many ways Jones’s writing style really suits the content. I have no doubts that the manuscript as is, could be a bestseller, but as it currently stands it will be nothing more than a flavor of the month. There needs to be genuine depiction of emotion and there has to be fleshed out relationships. His best friend is described as having pink hair and being bisexual, and she never gets explored much more than that (in the section we have).

I want desperately to like her, the book as a whole could very much benefit from a strong female character, based on what i’ve seen, but we are not given enough information for her to feel real.”

Jughead’s first reaction is anger. He even pounds his fist briefly on the table. But slowly he calms down while finishing his milkshake.

He reads the rest of the student feedback, and it is all positive. He could easily ignore Betty’s critique. She is clearly in the minority after all. But he keeps thinking about what she wrote. There is truth to it. That much is undeniable.

Finally Jughead pulls Betty’s chapter for next week from his satchel. He wants to hate it. It is a research based analysis of the effects of the rise in popularity of true crime podcasts. He should find it boring, but he can’t. There is something about her writing that pulls him from sentence to sentence till he’s lost track of time and fully engaged with the facts that she’s presenting.

This is nothing he would choose to read on his own time (he’s much rather listen to a true crime podcast), yet out of everything he’s read for this class so far, it is the best by far. He feels his stomach clench slightly. After reading this he knows, he can’t ignore her opinion.

If he really wants to get the most out of graduate school, and he does, he doesn’t have to befriend her, or seduce her, but he does have to find a way to get her to edit his manuscript. Maybe they can exchange manuscripts, or something. 

The next day he finds himself staring at her across the dining hall, trying to force himself to go over there and ask for her help. Still he can’t seem to make himself. A week later he works up the courage to ask her after class, only for Prof. Howe to ask Betty to stay back. 

Jughead promises himself that the next time he sees her, he will ask her. He doesn’t anticipate the next time he sees her to be at a party, but it is. It’s strange to see her at a party, because she never goes to them, but it makes sense in a way because Mia is the one who is throwing the party.

Jughead arrives an hour into the party and Betty’s drinking wine and lounging on a couch talking to Kay. Jughead grabs a beer and is just about to approach Betty when Mia shouts “Listen up.”

Everyone gets quiet and Kay says “So I know we all know each other at least a little, but I thought we could play two truths and a lie as a drinking game. Everyone would have to say two truths and a lie about themselves and if someone guesses the lie on the first try the person who said the two truths has to drink. If the person guesses incorrectly, everyone but the person saying the truths has to drink.”

Jughead and at least two other people groan loudly. Mia just shakes her head and says “Host makes the rules. If you don’t have a drink, go get one.” 

A few people shuffle off and return with refilled glasses. Then Mia says “I’ll start. My three things are 1. I’ve read all the Twilight books. 2. I owned a dog named J.D. Salinger, and 3. As a child I was severely injured while skiing.”

“Twilight is the lie.” Someone shouts out. “Even if you read them, you’d never bring it up.”

Mia smiles. “Twilight is the truth. J.D. Salinger is the lie. Drink up.” Jughead takes a swallow of his drink and Mia turns to Betty. “Your turn.”

Betty’s sitting up straight now. She’s wearing leggings and a light blue top, and when everyone turns to look at her, she seems entirely uncomfortable. 

“Ok. 1. I’ve never been in a relationship with a man. 2. The first time I read The Liar’s Club I cried. And 3. My best friend is named Archibald. 

“One.” A male poet shouts. 

“Drink.” Betty says.

The game goes on till everyone in the room is more than a little tipsy. Still once the game is finished Jughead heads straight over to Betty. As do two other guys in the room. He lets the two others talk to her first. One of them is a male poet, the other is his a fiction second year named Robert. He doesn’t really pay attention to them though. Once they leave Jughead walks up to Betty and says “Can I ask you something?”

She turns to him and says very loudly. “No thank you. I do not want to ride, or see your dick.” She marches off without even looking at his face, which is flushed with embarrassment. At first Jughead feels rather pissed at Betty. Why on earth would she react like that?

Than he hears Toni’s voice in the back of his head, telling him not to jump to the wrong conclusions. He realizes he must be missing something. So he goes looking for Robert who is drinking shots in the kitchen.

“What did you say to Betty?” Jughead asks Robert.

Robert flushes bright red “I showed her a picture and offered to be her first male relationship”. Robert does the very dumb air quotes sign with his fingers when he says the word relationship. 

“What was this photo of?” Jughead asks. Although he has an awful feeling that he thinks he knows. When Robert gets even redder Jughead says “That is not ok.”

Jughead heads outside and phone’s Toni. She’s the person he always turns to for advice. Toni picks up and Jughead can tell just by the level of noise around her that she is out at a bar.

“What’s up Jug?” She says and just hearing her voice makes him feel better. 

He explains the whole situation to her as best he can. She’s stepped outside the bar so she can actually hear him. When he’s done with his whole rant, Toni exhales loudly, and Jughead wonders if she’s smoking.

“It sounds like you asked her at the worst possible time.” 

“Still she shouldn’t have assumed that about me.”

“I would have.” Toni says. “In that context, you just can’t take it personally. She - a very private person according to you - disclosed something personal to a whole room full of people and at least one man, probably two, took that as an excuse to invade her space in a really terrible way.”

“Yes, but..”

“Just let it go. You didn’t do anything wrong, but the timing was all wrong. If you want to ask her again you can, but you can’t hold this against her.”

“But.”

“No, Jughead. Trust me on this one.” Toni says. “Let it go.”

“OK.” He says staring out at the back fence. He stays at Mia’s that night.

Jughead runs into Betty the next day at a Barnes & Nobles in the city and he curses himself at the timing, but she doesn’t seem to notice him. She’s in the fiction section, browsing the shelves, and she seems to be totally absorbed with what she’s doing. 

Jughead decides not to approach her. Instead he grabs a few books he’s considering buying, looks around for a chair, fails to find one and instead finds a spot on the floor next to the wall to sit so he can browse through the books. 

Half an hour later as he’s reading flipping through Truth & Beauty by Anne Patchett, someone says “Hi, Jughead.” He looks up and Betty’s standing not in front of him, but to his left. She’s not looking at him though, but at the shelf she’s next to.

“Hi, Betty.” He says.

“Sorry, It’s best if I don’t make eye contact, I’m working.” She says quietly, even though no one is near them that he can see. 

“You work for Barnes & Nobles?” He says quietly, following her lead. He thinks that it is kind of cool that she works at a bookstore, even though most of the people they went to school with would probably give her crap for having such a corporate job. 

“No, No.” Betty blushes and pulls a book from the shelf. “I’m a PI. They’ve hired me to go undercover. I catch people who are stealing from them.”

“Oh.” Jughead is shocked and suddenly sets up straighter. “Do a lot of people steal books?”

“Yes.” Betty says flipping through a book “though people stealing stationery is an even bigger issue. I spend over half my shift near there.”

“Wow. I had no idea. Are in-store PI’s common?”

“Yes. Since I’m now only working part time, it’s pretty much all I do.” 

“I had no idea you were a PI. How long have you been one?” Jughead asks, looking at Betty. He can tell she’s a good one. Even if someone was one aisle over they couldn’t tell Betty was talking.

“I was full time for three years before grad school.”

Jughead himself had gone straight from undergrad to grad school, partially because he started University at 21. It had taken him that long to extricate himself from the Serpents. 

He was impressed. “It seems like a much better job than my current one.”

“Checking people into the gym?” Betty says with a smile. “At least you actually get to read while doing it.” 

Betty was right, Jughead spent over half his shifts reading. “I bet this pays better though.”

“Much better.” Betty says with a shrug, and then he sees this expression cross her face that he struggles to interpret. “I’m sorry I yelled at you at Mia’s party. Mia told me you had were going to ask me about something else entirely.”

“I was.” Jughead says, shaking his head “But those other guys shouldn’t have said what they did to you.”

“No, they should not have. Probably one of the reasons why, though i’m attracted to men, I’ve never been in a relationship with one.” Betty says with a slight smile “That is also why I had such a problem with that bisexual character in your novel.”

“I’m working on it, actually…” A store employee walks by and Jughead falls silent.

After the employee passes, Betty sends Jughead an apologetic smile and says “Sorry, i’ve got to switch where i’m standing. I can’t have anyone figure out what I’m really doing. Talk to you later.” and with that she is off. 

The next time they talk is three days later. It’s the morning before the workshop they share and Jughead is at his place of work. Because the end of the quarter is fast approaching he’s a little overwhelmed with school work.

Instead of reading while manning the desk at the gym, he’s been writing feedback on everyone’s pieces. He’s concentrating very hard on a piece of fiction by Perry, one of his classmates when he hears the door to the gym open. He looks up and sees Betty. 

Her hair is in a high ponytail and she is dripping wet. “I didn’t think it was going to rain.” She says brightly to him, a smile on her lips in spite of the situation. 

“While it was your turn to visit me at work.” Jughead says as she hands him her ID. He still feels nervous around her but after bumping into her at the bookstore, he’s felt more comfortable. She seems more human now. More approachable. 

She laughs lightly. then she says “What did you want to ask me?”

Jughead takes a deep breath. “I was really grateful for the feedback you gave in Prof. Howe’s class. Your the best editor I’ve ever met. I really wanted to know if you would be up to editing my work? I can edit your manuscript in exchange, or offer you money or....”

Jughead doesn’t really have something obviously of equal value to offer here. He’s not a bad editor, but Betty’s manuscript is much more research based. He’s not sure he’s really the ideal editor for something like that. 

Betty’s got an odd expression on her face. She’s silent for a minute. Then she says “I’m sorry. I really want to say yes, and maybe I’ll have more time than I think I will next semester, but for now at least I’ll have to say no.”

“Ok.”

Jughead expects Betty to walk away. But she doesn’t, instead she says “I’m going to be one of the readers for the literary journal this year and I don’t know how much time that will take up yet.”

“Oh. Me too.” Jughead says. “Although I’m reading submissions for the fiction section and I assume you’ll be helping out with non-fiction.”

“No. I like reading fiction more, honestly. It gives me more of a break.” Betty says. “So I guess will be working together on that.”

“Good.” Jughead says. This isn’t what he wanted exactly, but it feels like a step towards that. Betty places both of her earphones in her ear and walks to the indoor track that runs behind the Jughead’s desk. 

Every so often over the next half hour as Jughead works, he glances behind him, and sees the blond bounce of her ponytail fly by.


	2. First Year, Second Quarter

It’s Jugheads first week back at school. Between his job, the new classes, and doing the readings for the literary journal internship, he feels like frozen soup. He’d come up with a more eloquent metaphor, but he’s too exhausted to. 

Which is why he doesn’t react initially when a tall red headed man slaps down Betty Cooper’s ID card at the gym desk where Jughead is working. He just scans it and nods, before taking a sip of his coffee. 

By the time Jughead has figured it out, the man is running laps around the track. Whoever he is, he’s a seasoned runner, much like Betty. He just keeps going. Jughead doesn’t want to interrupt him, but he’s finding it hard to concentrate. He just keeps reloading his email on his phone over and over again. Finally, the man stops and does a series of stretches.

Jughead knows that he has to do something about this. Jughead could get in real trouble if his boss discovers that he let someone in who hasn’t 1) attended the completely useless gym orientation, and 2) signed a legal waiver.

The gym’s busy right now, because it’s January. Everyone is wearing earphones and concentrating on sweating out all the junk food they inhaled over the holidays, Jughead doesn’t think anyone should overhear them. 

The man opens the door that divides the track from the rest of they gym. He’s sweating profusely. He chugs water and gets set up in the free weight area. Everything about him reeks jock and gym rat. Jughead wonders if this is Betty’s type, but he shakes that thought from his head. 

Jughead walks over and says “Excuse me,” loudly. The man takes his earbuds off. “I noticed that you used Betty Coopers ID. You can’t do that.” 

The man's face turns an impressive shade of beet red. Jughead almost feels bad for busting him. “I’m so sorry. I took it without her permission, I swear.”

“You stole it from her?” Jughead asks skeptically. It seems like a strange thing to steal. 

“Borrowed without permission is a more accurate term. She’s at work right now,” the man says with a shrug. “I’m Archie.” He adds as if telling Jughead his name should make this whole situation clearer. “You’re Jughead right?” 

Jughead is a little surprised that Archie knows his name. “Yes.” Jughead says, glancing back at the desk, but no one's waiting to sign in so he’s all good. “How do you know who I am?”

“Betty told me.” Archie says with a shrug.

“How do you know Betty?”

Archie laughs. Jughead’s surprised by the sound. It’s an endearing laugh somehow. “She’s my sister.”

“No offense, but you look nothing like her.”

“Adopted sister.” 

“Oh.” Jughead’s surprised by that. He doesn’t know why though. Lots of people are adopted, it’s not like he knows Betty well enough to know much about her background. 

She’s so private about everything, where as most of his life story is written down in manuscript form, and she’s already read parts of it. This sometimes makes him feel like he is at a distinct disadvantage. 

Then he thinks about Toni, how she’s not actually his sister, but he sometimes introduces her as such, because she feels like that. Maybe Archie means it that way. 

“Do you mean that metaphorically?”

“Literally. There was paperwork involved. My mom’s a lawyer, which helped.” Archie stands up and Jughead is struck by how much taller and bulkier Archie is than him. “But I mean she’s my sister by choice too. I can leave now. I don’t want you or Betty to get in trouble.”

Jughead shakes his head. He shouldn’t let Archie work out here, but they have these special cards they reserve for visiting professors and their families, a whole desk drawer full of them. If Archie signs the waiver he can give him one. 

“Look, I can give you a temporary pass, as long as you sign a waiver.”

“That would be great man!” A huge smile covers his face. A childlike one. He follows Jughead to the desk and they sort out the paperwork. 

“You can go back to working out now.” Jughead says with a shrug. He doesn't know why he went out on a limb for Archie. It might be Archies generally amenable nature, or it might be because he’s still holding out hope that Betty’s opinion of him will continue to change.

Betty’s stopped by the gym a few times since the Christmas breaks and things have seemed better between them, easier. She always asked about his manuscript, which made Jughead wonder if she was still considering editing it. 

“Thanks man.” Archie hesitates for a second and then he says. “Please don’t tell Betty I told you about her being adopted. I forget how private she is sometimes. I’m pretty much an open book. “

“I can tell that.” Jughead says with a laugh. 

Archie nods and heads back to the free weights area. 

The next morning Archie is back at the gym again and they exchange pleasantries. It turns out Archie’s in town for a week from LA, and that Betty’s been busy with PI work in the mornings. Two days after that Archie leaves. 

The next time Betty comes in she runs more than she usually does, a solid seven miles around the track. On the way out she surprises Jughead by stopping by the desk.

“Thanks for giving Archie the pass.”

“Sure.” Jughead says, trying not to act surprised. 

“He shouldn’t have tried to use mine.” Betty says with a shake of her head. “He’s always pulling shit like that, and he’s always getting away with it.”

“It’s because he’s so darn nice.”.

“I was going to say it was because he was a white male.” Betty says with a wink. “But he’s nice too.”

“I didn’t even know you had a brother till he showed up.”

“Yes. My family is a little hard to explain. Archie and I have known each other our whole lives, but his parents adopted me when I was nine.”

Jughead can’t help himself from being a little surprised by that. He had assumed when Archie said Betty was adopted that it was from birth, but clearly that wasn’t the case. 

“Do you have any sisters I should know about?” Jughead asks. Betty’s not meeting his eyes and looking out at the track instead. It’s busy today. Five runners are racing each other past the window behind him. 

“I was raised in a male dominated family actually. Mary, Archie’s mom, left when we were eleven, and so it was just Fred, Archie, and I from there on out. She’d visit sometimes but it wasn’t the same.” 

Jughead doesn’t point out the fact she’s sidestepped his question. Outside of Toni, his life growing up was all male. His mom left when he was seven and the things he can remember about her seem entirely inconsequential, like how she liked to drink her coffee cold. 

He can tell that Betty’s already said more than she wants to about this subject. When another student approaches the desk to be ID’ed, Betty’s relief is visible, when she waves goodbye.

Jughead’s workshop passes as it usually does when his work is not being discussed, which is to say the time passes slowly. He’s in Prof. Kelly’s class this quarter, and he’s surprised when she asks him to stay after class. 

He waits as the room slowly empties of people, chatting to his friend Matt for a while, till Matt leaves too. 

Prof. Kelly was older, a pettit women who had written a bestselling literary novel a decade ago, and had never followed it up. This was only Jughead’s third class with her, but he already liked her. He admires her sharp wit, and the agile way she kept the more snarky students, himself included, in line. 

“Jughead, do you mind going to my office with me?” Prof. Kelly asks, gathering her stuff. “It will be more private.”

“Hopefully I’m not in too much trouble.” He half joked. 

She smiles easily “None at all.” 

Her office is in one of the tiny rooms upstairs, but they head up together. He can’t help looking around the cramped space. It’s packed with books and pictures of a small child. “My son.” she supplies.

“So what do you want to talk about?” Jughead asks.

“Your manuscript. I was wondering if I could show it to my agent.”

That is a sentence Jughead had fantasized about hearing for years. The sort of thing he dreamed about as a teenager. But if his book had been published as a teenager that would have been a mistake. It was raw back then, compelling but unfinished. 

Betty’s word last quarter had thrown seeds of doubt that it still was.

“I’m just not sure it’s ready.”

“Oh?” Prof. Kelly has one eyebrow carefully arched. 

“Last quarter one of my classmates pointed out that it lacked emotional depth. I think she was right.”

Jughead half hopes that Prof. Kelly will rebut this sentiment, but after a moment's pause she says. “That student may be right. I haven't read the whole thing, but I did find it hard to connect with some of what I read emotionally.”

Jughead feels a rush that is part relief part frustration. On one hand, it is good to have Betty’s opinion confirmed. On the other it’s frustrating that no one else was forthcoming about it. It’s also frustrating that he will have to do more work. 

“I still want my agent to read it though. If you want to revise it first, I could give you to the first of July.”

“That would be great.” Jughead says. He wishes once again that he could have more feedback from Betty. He can’t shake the feeling that the book won’t really be finished till then. Which might mean it will never be finished.

 

***

Betty hates being late. But her phone didn’t charge, so her alarm didn’t go off, and now she’s running into the Starbucks off campus, ten minutes late for her meeting with the rest of the readers and her editor at the literary journal. 

She opens the door to the Starbucks and scans the room. There are two people she recognizes on the sofa in the back. One of them is Jughead. The other is Conner, the fiction editor. She rushes over to them “Sorry, I’m late.” 

“No need to apologize.” Conner says with a shrug. “Only you and Jones showed up at all. Do you want to grab a coffee?”

“Sure.” Betty sets down her backpack, retrieves her wallet and then orders. She’s a little nervous. She had hoped there would be more people here. Instead it was her, and two guys. Not her prefered work situation. She takes a deep breath and picks up her soy london fog from the far end of the bar.

When she sits back down, both men are intensely discussing one of the stories that had been submitted to them. 

Out of the hundred stories that were submitted to the journal, about five were good, ten had potential, and the rest were better suited for some highschool publication. Although all of this was just Betty’s opinion. She wasn’t even a fiction writer. 

Conner and Jughead were discussing a story called The Red Wheelbarrow and Betty shuffles through her papers to find it. She has notes on the top, all written out and ready to go. For her this story was just ok, but both men seemed really into it. 

The points they brought up seemed valid to her, but she just couldn’t connect with the narrator, the situation seemed too contrived.

They decided to place that story in the finalist pile. It would in all likelihood get published. Then Conner turns to Betty and asks her to share her favorite short story. 

Betty shuffles through the pile again till she got to one titled Orange Christmas, that she had found hilariously funny.

A huge smile broke out on Jughead’s face “That was my favorite too.”

“Really?” Conner said “I thought it had a good plot, it just wasn’t deep enough.”

“What do you mean by that?” Betty asks. “The dad Is dying. The whole situation outside of that is funny, because of how the author presents it, but I still really felt for the dad, and what the son was going through.” Betty had actually called Fred as soon as she had finished the story, just to touch base. 

“I guess what I mean is it just wasn’t literary enough.” Conner says. 

“I thought it was well written.” Jughead says. “There were so many memorable lines.”

“Yes, but the story was so straightforward.” Connor sighs. 

“I think the word you're looking for isn’t literary, but pretentious.” Betty says. “This story isn’t pretentious at all.” She regrets saying it as soon as the words leave her mouth. She doesn’t really know Conner, They’ve never had class together. This is the first time they had exchanged more than just basic pleasantries.

She expects him to snap at her but he shakes his head, and then smiles. “I think you might be right about that. I want more people to weigh in though.”

“Of course.” Betty says with a smile. But she’s glad he says that. She feels listened to, which is a start. 

As the afternoon progresses, she orders an americano and adds two packets of sugar. She feels surprised by how well all three of them work together, how easy it is to work with Jughead particularly. They’ve been debating work for four hours now and no one has snapped each others head off.

It’s not that they don’t disagree, they do. But when their tastes differ everyone is respectful about those disagreements, backing them up with facts and ideas. Conner never once pulls the but I’m the editor card and Betty is impressed by him for that. 

When they finally leave the Starbucks it’s dark outside, and the wind is awfully cold. Betty is not looking forward to the mile walk back to her apartment.

“Do you need a ride?” Jughead asks. Conner has already left in his car.

“That would be great.” Betty says. 

“It would be on my bike, if that’s ok.” 

Betty nods. She’s never been on a motorcycle before. The Andrews were firmly car people, and so were the Cooper’s. Although her memories of her biological family were fuzzy around the edges, she still remembers afternoons spent handing her dad car parts in the garage. Sometimes the scent of oil still makes her gag.

She shakes that thought away as she follows Jughead to his bike. He lends her a helmet, and she wonders just how many heads have worn it before, before strapping it on. 

It ends up being colder on the bike than it would have been walking, Still she gets the appeal of the vehicle. The way it glides down the street. It feels more powerful than a car, more honest somehow. Plus there is no obligation to talk, it would be more like shouting anyways. 

Jughead drops Betty off at her apartment above the bagel shop (creatively named The Bagel Shoppe), and she says thank you before hurrying upstairs to warmth and dinner, a quick pasta dish she throws together while listening to This American Life. 

She doesn’t have much time, because the local theater, just a few blocks away, is showing The Maltese Falcon tonight, as part of noir week, and Betty’s not willing to miss it. 

She eats the pasta quickly, bundles up in warmer coat, and runs the few blocks to the theater. She’s late for that too, it seems to be the theme of the day. When she slides into her seat in the mostly empty theater, it’s already dark except for the screen, displaying Humphrey Bogart's face. 

The movie is as good as she remembered it to be and at the end she’s surprised by the credits and the lights turning on. She is suddenly jerked back into the world of color.

“Betty.” a male voice exclaims loudly behind her, and she turns to see Jughead two rows back. She laughs. 

“Fancy running into you here.” Betty says. 

“It is a small town after all.” Jughead says with a shrug, standing up from his seat. 

He’s right. The town that their school borders is only seven or so blocks of businesses. But still she rarely runs into anyone from school. Most of the students tend to stick to campus, or go to the nearby city for events. This isn’t a college town, but a college located near a town. A very different thing.

“Did you like the movie?” Betty asks, pulling on her coat.

“As much as I did the first fifty times I saw it.” 

“Wow. I think this is only my tenth time.” 

“In middle school I really wanted to be Bogart.”

“That’s a weird ambition.”

“I was a weird kid.” 

Betty looks around for Jughead’s friends. Outside of work he’s usually always surrounded by at least two or three people. “Did you come alone?”

“Yes. Apparently black and white movies are a tough sell to most people these days.”

Betty can’t help but wrinkle her nose at that. She surprises herself by saying. “I’ll come with you anytime. They’re my favorite.”

“Good to know.” He’s grinning broadly now. She’s realizing more and more that her first impression of him was wrong. He’s got layers. More than she knows. Still she feels cautious around him.

She wonders sometimes, why she’s so leery of men, particularly when she was raised by one terrific guy, and best friends with another. But it comes down to her experience outside of the Andrews house. College in particular. 

Also as wonderful as Archie is, his romantic relationships with women weren't very healthy. He was the kind of person who fell quickly into into love, and just as quickly out of it. Fred would joke about it sometimes, asking her “Who do you think Archie is in love with this week?”. 

He had broken plenty of hearts in the process, never through deliberate malice, but still. It was funny, because for Betty love was a rare thing. She’d only said the words I love you to two people outside of Fred and Archie. One was her high school girlfriend Jennifer, and the other was Val, her college girlfriend. They had been together for well over a year when Betty finally said it. 

“Do you want to go get a drink?” Jughead asks, snapping Betty from he thoughts. Betty considers saying yes, but it’s late and she’s tired, and she has an early job tomorrow.

“Raincheck?” She says. He nods and they walk out of the theater talking about their favorite scenes. 

Outside of the gym, she doesn’t see him for a week after that. They no longer share a class. 

Every Tuesday Kay and Mia come over for dinner at Betty’s place and on Wednesday morning she always wakes up a little hungover, but happy. 

They spend most of their time talking about books, the ones they are writing and the ones they are reading. But there is always time left over to gossip about Professors and fellow students. 

Mia seems a little hung up on Jughead, a fact that Betty files away for later. Kay is dating a poet, a professor at another university in fact, and they all tease her for it. 

Betty’s life has little to gossip about in it. Between PI work, school work, literary journal work and actual writing, there doesn’t seem to be space for anything else. The fact that her friends are even attempting to juggle a partner in with all that has Betty in awe a bit. 

But when a cute women asks her out at the gym, Betty finds herself considering it, only to shake her head no. 

The other surprising part of her social life is Jughead. Almost every week after they accidentally attend the Maltese Falcon together, they deliberately go to the movies together. Always seeing a black and white film, but not always noir. They share popcorn and sometimes go out to coffee afterwards, to debate favorite films. They get into a lively argument about whether or not The Seventh Seal is good, and Betty likes to think she changes Jughead’s opinion on it. 

She is also seeing him regularly at editorial board meeting. More people show up after the first meetings, and it becomes a lively shouting match with everyone wanting to have their voices heard. 

Two of Jughead’s friends are in the group, but he still chooses to sit next to Betty. 

During the third meeting, she asks how his manuscript is going and he gets a nervous look in his eyes. “I could still use an editor.” He says quietly, with none of his normal confidence. 

“I’ll think about it.” she replies, and she really means that, before they are both swept back into the lively debate about a short story that moves in reverse. 

She hadn’t been thinking about his offer to edit it earlier, but now she was. He has the bones of a great story and he’s open to criticism, he seems to be actively seeking it. She can’t help but admire that. It’s so rare with writers. Many writers are eager to defend their work even before it’s been attacked. 

By the fifth editorial board meeting, they have selected the final group of stories, and Conner has chosen Betty to be the lead copy editor. 

She accepts, and to her surprise Jughead volunteers to help. He says he wants to learn to edit like she does. 

“I’m not sure that is something I can teach.” Betty says but she accepts the help, which is why on a miserable snowy March morning near the end of the quarter, she and he spend three hours in a Starbucks revising complete strangers stories.

It is pleasant, talking about what she is cutting and why. Then just before they leave Betty realizes that this is one of the nicest mornings she has had all month. So before they exit, she turns to him, and says “I’ll edit your manuscript.”

The look of delight that comes over his face, fills her heart with joy. She’s going to have to remind herself of that expression, when she’s knee deep in work next quarter. 

“That’s really great.” Jughead says “Because I promised Prof. Kelly I’d have it ready for her agent by July.”

“That’s a lot of pressure.” Betty says with an exhale, “Although I guess it’s not all on my end.”

“It’s not?” Jughead asks, looking impossibly young and questioning in that moment. 

“I mean my main critique was a lack of emotional depth. I can’t add that to your book. Unless you’ve already worked at it.”

Jughead sighs. They are standing in the doorway still. It’s too miserable out for them to exit and keep talking. Everyone who wants into the cafe has to walk between them.

“I’ve worked on it. The progress i’ve made is negligible. Maybe you could read it through once and give me more specific feedback, like where the manuscript most needs it.”

“That could work. I mean I haven't read the whole manuscript. Maybe it’s there already.” 

“I don’t think so.” Jughead says with a shrug. And with that they leave, making tentative plans for the movies on Wednesday. 

Betty comes home to Jughead’s manuscript already in her inbox. She reads through it over the next few days, taking it in fifty page sections. It’s a good manuscript and Jughead has already helped Toni seem more like a character/person, although he still could do a better job. It’s particularly important that he gets this right, because outside of a passing crush on a waitress, and a mention of a long gone mom, she’s the only women in the manuscript. 

The emotional development is still thin. When Jughead’s father is sentenced to jail, Jughead’s literary alter ego, basically shrugs and gets down to business in terms of clearing his father's name. That doesn’t strike Betty as realistic. 

The more she reads, the more Betty feels like she’s reading around something. Something that Jughead left out. Whatever it is, Betty begins to suspect that it’s part of the reason the book feels so emotionally distant. 

She wasn’t sure if it what is left out is an event, an emotional reaction, or both. But Betty could almost feel it in parts, like she was nearing the heart of the story, only for the heart to be missing. 

Betty understands why he would want to keep something for himself. After all writing about one’s own life was an incredibly vulnerable thing to do. Jughead as a person was tight lipped as they come, but here he was with a book that he had written, that revealed more or less his whole past. 

Betty wasn’t that kind of brave. She stuck to things that she could research. The things that surrounded her obsession, rather than the source itself. 

She might never write about the crime that had re-rooted her life, but she would probably write around that crime forever. And that was ok, because she was writing about other people, other crimes. Jughead was not.

Without the part of the story that Jughead was keeping for himself, Betty didn’t think the book Jughead had poured so much of his life into would ever be as good as it could be. 

She doesn’t tell all this to Jughead right away. She just says she’s working on it. While she writes up more notes than she knows what to do with. 

The quarter is winding down, but this time because of the classes she’s taking and when she’s presented her work, she doesn’t actually have anything major hanging over her. So she spends her time working on her own manuscript and Jughead’s. 

Betty is in the library on the last day of class. She’s already handed everything in, so she’s taking this time to research fingerprinting and how it was discovered and established, before the library partially closes for break. 

Betty is having a hard time focusing though. She was up late last night following a cheating husband, the most cliche of all PI jobs, but part of what kept the firm afloat. 

“Excuse me.” Betty looks up, towards the voice. It’s a short girl with long dyed pink hair, and a warm smile. “Is anyone sitting here?”. The girl gestures at the other side of the table. 

“No, go ahead. Be my guest.” Betty says with a smile, gesturing at the chair.

“Good. I’m Toni by the way.” The girl offers, scooting her chair in.

“Betty.”

“Betty as in Betty Cooper?” 

“Yes, how did you know?” 

“I’m friends with Jughead. He’s super excited that your editing his manuscript.”

“I’m working on it.” Betty gestures at the books that surround her “Just not right now.” Something clicks into place in Betty’s head. “Wait, you’re Toni from the manuscript.”

Toni smiles. “Indeed I am. I told him he has to rename me before he publishes it though.” 

“Fair enough.” Betty looks at the books that surround her, and come to the conclusion that she was probably not going to get anything else done right now. She might as well get to know Toni the person. It might even help improve her feedback about Toni the character.

“What are you up to?” Betty asked Toni.

Toni looks around “I was going to read. I have two hours to kill before Jughead get out of class and I don’t want to spend them in his crappy two roommate filled apartment.”

“Fair enough.” Betty laughs. “My place is only a five minute walk from here. Do you want to come over have a drink. I’m done with my work here.”

A conflicted look crosses Toni’s face, but only for a second, replaced with a smile. 

The walk over to Betty’s place passes quickly. It turns out that Toni’s a photographer, a fact that is never mentioned in Jughead’s book, and certainly should be. She takes pictures of the houses they pass, and Betty makes sure that they take a slight detour so that Toni can see the castle a former mogle built that is now for sale. 

Because it is for sale, they walk right up to it and wander around the outside. No one had lived in it for over a year.

Toni takes a lot of pictures of the castle. “This is incredible. I don’t know why Jughead didn’t show it to me.”

“He probably doesn’t know about it. His apartment’s on the other side of campus, right?”. Toni nods. 

By the time they’re back at Betty’s apartment, Betty knows all about the terrible Photography profesor Toni’s dealing with in San Francisco. It makes Betty feel grateful that so far all of her teachers have at the very least been sane. 

“What do you want to drink?” Betty asks, as she opens the door to her junior one bedroom. It’s a nice apartment. Certainly nicer than anywhere she lived in undergrad. It has a well organized kitchen and two large windows in the main room. The whole place is painted a beautiful soft blue. 

“This is great. You have all this to yourself?” Toni asks. Betty nods.

“I got used to living on my own the last few years. Working as a PI helps me cover the costs.”

“You’re a PI?”

“Yes. I did it for three years after undergrad, and now it’s just part time work for my old firm.”

“Wow.”

“You know PI work is generally a good fit for photoghers.” Betty says. “I know some PI’s in San Francisco, I could put in a good word for you if you were interested.”

“I very well might be.” Toni says with a tight smile. 

“What do you want to drink?” Betty asks, and after a little debate they settle on coffee and Betty makes it in the french press. Toni walks around the living room looking at the photographs Betty has hung. 

She pauses at the one Betty knows she should take down but hasn’t yet. “Who is this?” She asks. Toni’s pointing at a picture of Valerie and Betty right after they graduated college. They’re in Sienna, on the campo drinking wine, their arms slung around each other.

It was one of the best trips of Betty’s life, and whenever she sees that picture she thinks of the trip more than she thinks of Val. Still, even now, most of her thoughts about Val were good ones.

“That’s my ex-girlfriend Val and I, a long time ago. We broke up right after I moved here and I haven't had the heart to take it down.”

“Were you together long?” Toni asks. 

“Almost seven years.” 

“Damn. The longest relationship i’ve ever been in was less than a year.”

“We met in undergrad.We were roommates first actually.” Betty says, pouring two cups of coffee. “But she’s moved on now, and i’m writing my thesis, so we’re all sorted.”

Toni nods and Betty changes the subject to Toni’s work. It’s easy to talk to her. The time passes quickly and soon Betty is walking Toni back to campus, and somehow she feels like their on the edge of friendship.

Toni turns to Betty suddenly, and says “Jughead really trusts you’re feedback.”

“I know.” Betty says with a raised eyebrow. 

“And so do I. I mean I read the book this summer and I hated how he wrote me. I just felt like it was a paper character. I told him that in nicer words, and he just sort of shrugged it off. But somehow you got through to him. He’s shown me some of the edits, and they really feel like a vast improvement.”

“Thanks. I was only able to get through to him, because I had the advantage of being a stranger and a peer, in terms of school.” Betty says with a shrug. 

“So you really think this book could be something?” Toni asks, a curious look in her eyes. 

“Everyone else loved it. At least two profs have offered to introduce him to their agents. Even without my edits, it would be something.”

Toni smiles softly. “He’s been writing his whole life. When we were little it was all about mythical creatures, but since he was a teenager it’s all this. It would just be so great if he could make a living out of it.”

Betty knows that even if this manuscript becomes a book, and that book becomes a bestseller, that’s not really how it works. After all Anthony Doeer who won the Pulitzer prize and was on the New York Times Bestseller list for what felt like years, is still teaching to make his actual living. 

But she doesn’t need to explain all that to Toni right now. Besides Jughead already knows that. So Betty just smiles and says “I really think he will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am always grateful for Feedback. Progress is happening (as you can see), although it’s not romantic progress yet, and it won’t be for a while. 
> 
> Sorry for the longest delay i've ever had between chapters. Next update should be within a week or two. 
> 
> Chapter three involves an all important walk (and talk) in the woods.


	3. First Year, Third Quarter

Jughead arrives back on campus after a weeklong road trip to South Carolina with Toni to visit her extended family. 

His first class is abuzz with the news that Betty was chosen as the head editor for the literary journal next year. Considering the fact that all of the previous editors of the aforementioned literary journal have gone on to have successful careers in publishing, this is a big fucking deal. 

Jughead sends her a congratulatory text as soon as he hears. He gets a text back - Gathering at my place tonight - 8 PM.

It feels strange to attend a party at Betty’s considering she never really attends other people's party. But he finds out when he arrives at her apartment that it really is just a gathering.

Conner is there of course, seeing as he is the person who nominated Betty for the job. So are Kay and Mia, but that’s it. Betty has baked a batch of chocolate cupcakes and there is wine on the counter and beer in the fridge, but it is very lowkey. 

Jughead helps himself to a glass of wine and a cupcake and then sits on the sofa next to Conner. Kay and Mia are engaged in an intense conversation on the loveseat across from them Betty is on the chair next to Kay and Mia, just listening.

Jughead takes a bite into the cupcake and is impressed by the dense chocolate-y taste. He takes another bite and another, and then is surprised by the slight crunch of graham cracker crumbs and the fluff of marshmallow. It is such a good surprise, he finds himself smiling. 

“Is this a secret smore cupcake?” Jughead says to Conner who is on his second. 

Conner smiles “Yes, Magnolia’s has nothing on Betty, in my opinion.”

“Agreed.” Jughead says, taking another bite. He and Connor talk about the cover art for this issue of the literary journal, and then find themselves talking about trends in literary fiction as a whole.

Eventually Kay and Mia calm down enough to talk to people besides each other and they and Kay start a debate about favorite genre books, by bringing up Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. Jughead’s a little surprised to discover that Betty’s favorite is Farewell My Lovely. 

When Kay brings up the fact that the book is problematic, Betty says “Name one book published during that period that isn’t.” No one can think of one. 

The conversation slowly evolves until everyone is talking about their plans for the summer. This quarter may have just started, but summer is already looming large. All the good internships and opportunities have application periods that ended months ago, so they all know more or less what they are going to do. 

Conner is graduating. He’s already got an internship at a publishing house in New York that he’s hoping to turn into a full-time job, but he’s not terribly optimistic. 

Kay and Mia are planning to spend the summer in Spain teaching English.

Jughead’s got a job lined up at City Lights, the bookstore, not the press, in San Francisco. He’s planning to crash at Toni’s apartment to save on rent. 

Betty lights up when he says that. “Archie’s going to be in San Francisco for the summer, working as an assistant at a record label. I’m going to visit him for a week so I can see you then.” 

Jughead likes that idea. As much as he loves Toni, after a week spent in a pretty cramped space with her, he was a little nervous about the summer. It would be great to see Betty, and so what if he didn’t know Archie well, he could hang out with him anyway. 

“What impressive internship do you have lined up Betty?” Mia asks. It comes off a little snide, but Jughead’s not sure if that is the intent. 

“I don’t have one. I want to keep my apartment, and be able to pay for school, so outside of visiting Archie, i’ll be working full time for my old PI firm.” Betty says with a shrug. 

“What do you as a PI?” Conner asks “Do you take photos of cheating husbands.”

“Sometimes, but that is just a small part of the job. Often i’m a store detective, and I have to pretend to shop for hours while looking for anyone that might be stealing something. When I am working full time, I do research for my firm, so it’s not that different than what I do for my writing. Before I switched to part time, that was my primary job.” Betty says, taking a sip of wine.

“And you like it?” Kay asks. 

“I do. I mean i’m good at it, which helps. Although if I spend all day researching for work, I can’t get any of my own writing done in the evening. That part of my brain just stops working.”

Jughead gets more cupcakes and the rest of the evening passes easily. He drops Mia off at her apartment, and he’s glad when she doesn’t ask him in. 

He’s seeing someone in the poetry program right now, Lara, He’s seeing her exclusively, not seriously, but exclusively. He’s trying not to talk about it though. 

He hasn’t even mentioned it to Betty, because he doesn’t want anyone to get the impression that it could be anything more. Certainly not Lara. She says she doesn’t want anything more, but sometimes he’s not sure. 

The first couple of weeks back at school passed quickly. Everything was normal, more or less. Betty awards him with the role of fiction editor for the literary journal next year. His classes are going well. 

He sees Lara twice a week, he hangs out with his friends most day for lunch, He works on his manuscript, and spends time with Betty at the movies. He finally decides to go with Prof. Howe as his thesis advisor. He is relieved but not surprised when Howe says yes.

One Friday he’s working at the gym, when Betty comes in. She’s already covered in sweat, it’s warm out, and she’s clearly run here. 

He waits for her to hand over her gym card but she doesn't, Instead she just stares at him for a second and then she says. “I’m not here to workout. I have a great idea.”

“Ok.” He says, 

“I think we need to go for a walk in the woods.” As great ideas go this one feels more than a little anticlimactic. But then Betty continues “We keep being stuck on your manuscript. We’ve got it so far, but we haven't made any progress for weeks.”

“I know all that, obviously.”

“But then I thought about what I do when I’m stuck. I go for a run, or a hike and I try to think about other things, and then usually the answer comes to me.”

“Ok.” 

“Steve Jobs used to believe in doing a walk and talk whenever he was stuck. It’s not just me, lots of people do it. I thought maybe you and I could drive to the mountains next week and go for a long hike.”

Jughead was not a fan of long hikes, generally speaking. But he gets that the idea behind it is a good one. He also doesn’t mind having an excuse to spend the day with Betty. Now that the work on the literary journal is done for the year, he hasn’t seen her much outside of the movies. 

“OK. I could do Saturday.”

“Me too.” Betty says with a smile before putting her earphones back in and running off. 

Jughead can’t help but feel a little spoiled by the fact that she’s putting so much time, effort, and thought into this. Through editing together they have transformed Toni’s character into someone much more real and Toni-like without giving too much away. Toni herself was thrilled with the edits.

Even though Jughead doesn’t have much, he’s tried to offer Betty money in exchange for all the work she’s done but she keeps turning him down. He’s beginning to think that he’ll have to come up with a better idea. Maybe a present of some sort. 

That night Jughead heads to Lara’s apartment. He likes Lara in part because she’s a poet. She’s part of the same MFA program but slightly removed from the inner workings of fiction. 

The drama in poetry is mostly separate from fiction, and as far as Jughead can tell, largely orchestrated by Kevin Keller, the only graduate student to make it into the Best New Poets Anthology this year and the poetry editor of the literary journal next year. 

Lara and Jughead are eating pizza and watching Parks and Rec on Netflix when he brings up how excited he is by his plan with Betty. He loves the idea that they might actually make progress on his manuscript. 

“Why is Betty helping you?” Lara asks. “I thought she didn’t like guys.” 

It’s a small program, so Jughead’s not surprised that parts of Betty’s reputation have proceeded her.

“Her best friend is a guy.” Because even if Archie is her brother, he’s also more than that. It was more than just legality it was choice. In any case it was something he didn’t need to get into with Lara. 

“I meant romantically. She’s a lesbian right?”

“Bisexual.” Jughead corrected. “But i’m not interested in her like that.”

“Then why is her feedback so important?” Lara says, taking a strand of her blond hair and twirling it around her finger.

“She’s the best editor I know. Plus she saw something missing in my manuscript when no one else did.”

“So? Who says she’s right?” 

“Everyone who re-read it after I pointed the gap out to them.” Jughead said. It’s not a lot, but a few of his buddies and two of his profs, now agree with Betty.”

Lara’s eyes are glued to Leslie Knope on the TV screen, but he can tell she’s not really watching it. Finally a few minutes later when Ron Swanson is eating bacon she speaks. “You’d tell me if you were sleeping with someone else right?”

“Of course.” Jughead says, leaning over to plant a kiss on her lips. “That’s our deal right?”

Lara nods. “But what’s separating that from an actual relationship? One where you were my boyfriend and I was your girlfriend.”

Jughead hates those words, boyfriend and girlfriend. They seem so foreign, so awkward to him. The only person that has called him boy in a very long time is his father. So the very word boy probably counts as a trigger for him. 

“There’s a big difference. I’m not stopping you from looking around. If you find someone else you're interested in, or you grow bored, you can end this at anytime. No need to fight.”

“Don’t you mean you can do all of those things?” Lara says, her eyes now very focused on his face. Her own flickering in the light of the television. 

“Yeah. Both of us get the same rights.” Jughead doesn’t think this is very complicated. It’s really rather straightforward, actually. 

“What if I want more?” Lara says.

“Do you?” Jughead asks.

“Yes.” She says.

“I’m sorry, but i’m out.” Jughead said. It hadn’t been long between them, just two months. He had liked her enough, but he wasn’t sure he wanted what they had, and he was sure he didn’t want more. 

“Really?” Lara says with a wry head shake. “I always thought you were better than a reputation.”

“I’m not.” Jughead says standing up and pulling on his shoes. It was warm out, there was no need for a coat. He didn’t want this conversation to go on anymore. He’d been clear what he’d wanted coming into this. If he hadn’t been direct he would feel guilty, but that wasn’t the case this time. 

Still he was frustrated. He was half way down the block when he got a text from lara that said Come back please. We can talk.

He knew nothing good could come from that. Instead he gets on his bike and rides home. He calls Toni once he’s back in his room. 

She picks up and he asks her if this was a good time to call. “As good as any. What’s up?” 

He was relieved to tell her everything. He was so grateful that he could do that with Toni. It helped that she was probably as commitment phobic as he was. Finally when he stopped talking Toni asked “Do you think this is about Betty?”

“What do you mean?” Jughead asks. 

“I mean, you and Lara were talking about Betty, when she started to ask for more.”

“So?” Jughead says. “Betty and I are not together.”

There was silence on the other end of the line, than a sigh jughead had heard many times before. “You are not. But you like her.”

“She’s a friend.” It might not have started out that way, but that is certainly where they stood now.

“Jug, cut the bullshit.” 

“I’m not bullshitting.” 

“Then you’re not being honest with yourself. I heard you talking about her in South Carolina all week. You barely mentioned your other friends. My aunt thought Betty was your girlfriend because you brought her up so often.”

“So. I like her as a friend.” Jughead says this, but in his head he starts to question his own reasoning. In the past Toni’s always been a good judge of his character, she’s known things about Jughead before he’s known these things about himself. If she was so convinced there had to be something going on there, there might be.

“No, you get this other tone in your voice. Something I haven't heard in a long time, Jug.”

Shit. And there it was, the partial root of his commitment issues, just a casual reference to her, could make his pulse race. 

“While that was a fucking disaster.” Jughead says, even though Toni clearly knows that. She was there when the fallout happened.

“Betty is not like Tiffany.” Toni says calmly. 

“And you know that from what, having coffee with her?” Jughead asks. 

“Yes. It was very enlightening coffee. Do you know that her last relationship with her last girlfriend lasted seven years. She’s nothing like Tiffany.”

Jughead exhales. “I don’t think Betty likes me like that.” 

There was silence on the other end of the line and then a soft “I think you’re right about that.” 

Part of Jughead felt disappointed by that answer, the other part felt relief. He didn’t need anything serious in his life right now, and anything with Betty he felt like would have to be serious.

“That is probably for the best.” Jughead says. Toni agrees and they chat for a while before he hangs up. 

Now that he knows he has feelings for Betty he actively pushes against that. All week he tries to find new ways to shove her into the friend box. He’s not sure if these methods work or not. But one of his main strategies is to not look at her, if he can help it. Even when they are talking. She must notice but she doesn’t say anything. 

 

***

Betty borrows a car from the PI firm for a day. Her bosses don’t care about things like that if work isn’t too busy. It’s a two hour drive to the hike she wants to go on, and she doesn’t want to be on the bike for that long. 

She’s brought over a dozen cookies, and six sandwiches as well as two thermoses worth of coffee, but she’s still budgeted time on the way back to stop for dinner. She knows of a town that has a diner Jughead will love. 

Jughead walks out the door to the building, and spots her, a soft grin covers his face for a moment, before it’s replaced with his more standard smile. Then he gets in the car. 

Betty lets Jughead choose the music on the ride up. She wants him to feel comfortable and safe. She wants all of this day to be good for him. She thinks the more at peace he is, the more likely they are to figure this out. 

She knows physical exertion isn’t his favorite thing. While she runs into him in the gym all the time, only once was he working out. But this hike isn’t that challenging and the views are more than worth it. 

They don’t talk much on the way up. Exchanging little bits of gossip. Betty heard that he has ended things with Lara and that she’s pissed, through the campus grape vine, but she doesn’t see the point of bringing it up. It does remind her of the fact that dating in a community like this one isn’t for Betty. 

NYU’s undergraduate population was huge and so Val and her dating didn’t really cause any gossip, besides by the time they’d broken up, school was something they did years ago. 

Betty and Jughead reach the trailhead at 11. Betty applies some sunscreen and offers Jugehad some. Then after pulling on their packs they head up the trail. It’s a well maintained trail on a weekend so it’s a little crowded at the start, but Betty sets a good steady pace and soon they are alone except for the occasional trail runner. 

“I forget how beautiful trees can be.” Jughead says.

“That’s like forgetting how to breath.” Betty shakes her head. 

On the way up they mostly talk about school. Betty spent a lot of this quarter struggling to choose a thesis advisor, but this week she’d finally settled on Prof. Fog. His comments seemed the most insightful. Jughead is planning to take Prof. Fog;s literary theory class next quarter. 

They make it to the summit, a beautiful view of the valley and a lake, at two, only then does Betty let them eat lunch. As anticipated Jughead manages to polish off four sandwiches and seven cookies. 

After lunch Betty notices a contentment settle in around Jughead’s shoulders. He jokes with her casually and lazily. All seems to be looking up for a productive walk home. She doesn’t say anything yet, though. 

Jughead insists on carrying the backpack back. Betty restrains herself from pointing out that it is much lighter now that they have consumed the majority of its contents. 

Betty’s walking along the trail trying to think up the most natural way to bring up the subject of his book, when Jughead says “Do you know why I eat so much?”

“No.” Betty says with a casual shake of her head. She’s in front on the hike, and he’s two feet behind her. 

“As a kid there was never enough food in my home.”

“That wasn’t my issue as a child. In either home.” Betty’s never sure about bringing up her life before nine, but she’s hoping that if she’s open and honest he will be too. “Although at the Andrews there was a lot more junk food. I swear when I was a teenager, I went a solid month eating nothing but pizza and burgers.”

“My dream diet.” Jughead quips. 

“I brought my highschool girlfriend over for dinner once, and she referred to my house as a man cave, and refused to return. It was probably true, but I was so insulted, I broke up with her.” 

“Ouch.” Jughead says, laughing lightly. At the time it had felt like such a big deal to Betty like her second family, the better one, was still deemed not good enough. 

Plus it went along with other things. It took Betty forever to figure out that a heated pillow really helped with period cramps, because how could Fred be expected to know such things? She found out about motrin from a commercial. She was miles behind in areas like makeup, and eyebrow shaping all through high school. Val taught her about such things, first as her friend, and then as her girlfriend. 

“It was probably the right thing to do. She liked singing Britney Spears to herself in the shower.”

Jughead laughs “So you figured all this out quickly? You were just like this is who I am, I like girls and guys.”

“It didn’t seem that simple at the time. Besides I was raised by guys. I know what their thinking. It probably doesn’t help that Archie’s always been a bit of a player. I’ve always found it easier, to be with women. I’ve just found that women make long term stable partners, and that seems to be what I’m looking for.”

Betty shrugs. There are exceptions to this of course, such as Fred. In her experience, most of the guys her age were all about not being tied down. Betty didn’t go into a relationship thinking it would be forever, but she liked to think that forever was an option down the line. 

“It’s funny, the only girl I seriously dating was not a good long term stable partner.”

“Oh?” Betty asks. Jughead’s never mentioned anyone serious to her. There are no romantic interest in the manuscript, and he’d never been serious about anyone at school. In fact he had never talked with Betty about anyone in the program sexually or romantically. Everything she knew about his dating history was second hand. 

“I met someone right at the end of high-school. I was a Serpent then, and she was from a wealthy family. I don’t know what I was to her. An experiment, a fun change of pace, slumming it? In any case I thought that she was it.”

“Wow.” Betty exhales. A heart broken at the wrong time can do a lot of damage. 

“We were together for over a year, so she was there when I became head of the gang and they started calling me king. She liked that. She changed her Instagram name to Tiffany_Queen”

“So her name was Tiffany? That had to be a clue.”

Jughead laughs, they’re still walking along at a fair pace. “You would think I would pick up on that. I’ve always been particular about words. Even back then.”

“So, why isn’t she in the book?” Betty asks, because this might be her missing piece. It seems very likely that it is. 

“A cliched romance with a wealthy rich girl that then cheats on me with the head of the rival gang? Hard pass. It sounds like a bad YA novel.”

Betty can’t stop herself from laughing. “I’m not saying she should be the focus, but she was clearly formative in some way.”

“How?” Jughead says, he stops walking and turns towards her. It’s clear he really wants to hear this answer. They’ve gone beyond bantering now. 

“You just told me she was your only serious relationship. It seems pretty obvious that as much as your dismissing it now, it had a pretty profound impact.”

“I mean she’s the reason my dad went to prison initially. She’s the one who found the gun planted in my trailer and tipped off the police.”

“And you took her out of the fucking book?” Betty says. She can feel that her jaw has in fact dropped. It’s a good thing no one is around them because they’ve both stopped in the middle of the path now, and are shouting. 

“Because it didn’t seem right to give her that kind of credit.”

Betty understands that. She gets it. The story of her past is one she doesn’t tell because she doesn’t want the wrong person to get the credit, to get the attention. And they always do. It’s not the victims that are focused on, but the perpetrators.

She gets that Jughead is pushing against this impulse, even if he would not call it such. 

“Can I give you a weird revision suggestion?”

“As long as it isn’t to add Tiffany to the manuscript.”

Betty thinks he may well have to, but that’s not the next step. “I think you have this idea of the manuscript not being able to convey your emotions because it’s art, and I don’t think that’s right. What if you just added your emotion back into things? Maybe even some of the feelings you had about Tiffany without directly adding her.”

“But most literary books, particularly non-fiction ones, don’t have emotions. Think about In Cold Blood, it’s so powerful because Truman Capote is so emotionally distant.”

Betty laughs. “Capote wasn’t directly involved in those crimes at all. He didn’t know the victims, he only met the perpetrators in the context of writing, he had every reason to be cold, disconnected. Your book is about your life. Even subtracting Tiffany and the feelings she generated in you, it is only natural to react dramatically to one's father being incarcerated, ones tattoo being sawn off, etc, etc.”

“But art is different than life.” Jughead says, but he doesn’t shout it, his voice is soft. It’s clear that he’s really listening to her. One arm reaches out and brushes her shoulder. 

“But real art, should reflect that in some way. One cannot live without pain. It is a real part of the human experience.”

“And you don’t think my narrator experiences pain? As you mentioned he gets his tattoo knifed off, among other things.” Betty watches as Jughead unconsciously rubs his shirt sleeve on the spot where she believes the tattoo once was. 

“Yes. It’s one line. You say it hurts like a “sonofabitch” which is cliche by the way, and then you move on. It’s never mentioned again. You don’t talk about it needing stitches or even a bandage. 

“Stitches, it was stitches.”

“It doesn’t feel real because it doesn’t have lingering effects.”

“I reference it at the end of the book.”

“Yes, but by then it’s just become a metaphor.”

“It always was a metaphor.” Jughead says, throwing both hands up in the air. 

“So you’re saying that if I roll up your shirt sleeve, I won’t see a scar?”

Jughead scoffs. “You don’t know how hard this is. Writing about yourself. It’s a whole different beast. There’s a lot of things that you know, that the whole school knows, that I wish they didn’t.”

Betty pauses. They’ve gotten loud again, and she can see a family approaching them from a distance, on the path. 

She gets what he’s saying. There is a reason she doesn’t write about herself. But as much as he’s a private person, he’s chosen this, to write about himself, and workshop it in a public setting. It’s not like anyone was forcing him to do that. 

Jughead must notice the family approaching too, because he starts walking again at a quicker pace, Betty follows him, and soon they can’t see the family any longer. 

“I don’t write about myself, I don’t put myself out there for a reason. This is a choice you made Jughead. You don’t have to put Tiffany in the manuscript, if you don’t want to. But you have to put consequences in there, emotional consequences.”

“What if I don’t want to dredge up those feelings?” Jughead’s voice is lower now, but Betty can tell he’s still upset. But they are setting an even pace, hiking again.. 

“Pretend you're making them up.” Betty says. 

Jughead laughs. “I can try.” 

“You should. I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but you are so close to this manuscript becoming a book that is real, that is good.”

Jughead turns back towards her, “do you really mean that?” 

She nods, “Bestselling authors have told you that. Why does my opinion matter so much to you?”

“Because your the most honest person I know.” 

Betty knows that he means it. And he’s probably true. In workshop a lot of the time even the critical feedback she receives is buried under layers of politeness, which makes it hard to get to. Betty’s not like that. 

She remembers once in junior year of high-school she wrote some unpleasant but honest feedback on another student's paper and the teacher hauled Fred Andrews into a parent-teacher-student meeting. After reading the feedback Fred had just shrugged and said “it sounds honest to me.” The teacher got rather irate.

“That’s usually not a plus.” Betty says with a smile.

“It is with me. My dad always lied to me growing up. Always said he was going to get sober, or stay sober, variations on a theme. Even Toni, who is capable of brutal honesty lies to me out of love. She only told me how mad she was at me about the manuscript, after she heard your feedback.”

“Sorry.” Betty gets it, sometimes honesty can be the best gift.

“Just promise me you won’t start lying, now that you actually like me.” Jughead glances back at her and shoots her a grin, after he says that. 

“Who says I like you?” Betty says. They are almost at the trailhead at this point, but she thinks the important stuff they had to say, has been said, now. It’s up to Jughead to implement it, but he has everything he needs to move forward now. 

* * *

Jughead hasn’t felt like this in a while. All week in social situations he nods, and pretends to listen, but the whole time he’s actually thinking about revising. Every night he can’t wait to get home to his laptop and revise the next situation of the manuscript. 

Adding Tiffany after renaming her Trista had been so much easier than he expected. The biggest surprise is that it feels right. Adding her into the manuscript is like slotting a piece into a puzzle. There is space for her, it’s always been there, he just didn’t know what to do with it beforehand. Now he does. 

He doesn’t remember feeling this addicted to writing in years. Part of what is driving him this time, isn’t just a love of the words, or the desire to complete it, but the idea that Betty will have feedback for him, at the end of this. 

Also if he’s going to make the July 1st deadline for the agent, he’s got to get it to Betty within the next two weeks. 

His good friend Matt starts calling him a hermit, and he can’t even give a shit. He just shrugs and mutters something about the muse.

When he hands the manuscript over to Betty, Jughead almost feels like weeping. But she takes it from him, meets his gaze and says “I will take very good care of this.” and he knows she will. She has put so much work into making his manuscript the best she can. 

“I trust you with my life.” he says, and she winks. 

The week that she takes editing the manuscript is the most stressful one. She’s extra busy, so she cancels their standing movie meetup. He spends time with his friends instead. He and Mia get drinks, but nothing else happens, and then suddenly it’s been a week and Betty’s handing him his manuscript back. 

There is a lot of red ink on it, but it’s mostly reserved for semicolon and spelling errors that were made while adding the additional information. 

“You did what you needed to do.” Betty says. He feels filled with joy. 

“It was your walk that did it. As much as I resisted your advice at first it was the right advice.”

Betty nods, a soft smile covering her face, and in that moment he wants terribly to kiss her, He hasn’t wanted anything so badly in ages. Instead he swallows, breathes heavily and says “as a thank you, I bought your tickets for San Francisco this summer. I got the dates from Archie, so they should be the right ones.”

She hugs him and he keeps thinking to himself, remember you’ve got to keep this platonic, like it’s a mantra.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think it’s funny that even though it’s called the quarter system, most students don’t actually attend the summer quarter, and so neither will Betty and Jughead. 
> 
> You might have noticed the chapter count go up by one. I decided that even though they won’t be in school, I can’t really skip the summer between first and second year (the focus of next chapter - Fred makes an appearance). 
> 
> So far Jughead has had to face some hard truths, but Betty’s going to have to do that soon as well.
> 
> Thank you so much for the feedback on this story! It’s been so encouraging and wonderful in every way. 
> 
> I am always grateful for comments.


	4. The Summer

Betty spends most of the summer inside, trying not to think about the manuscript Jughead handed into the agent on the last day of June. She can’t help but be invested in its fate. After all she’s put hours of work into it. 

Still she knows turnaround time is slow for such things, particularly during summer. Everyone’s warned Jughead that he might not hear anything till October or November. 

Betty works long hours at the PI firm. Most of it is research, although she has the occasional tailing job, and a few last minute store detective gigs. It feels like most of the summer passes without her really being able to enjoy it. Although thankfully she takes an extra day off work at the end of July and drives up to Riverdale to spend a long weekend with Fred.

Fred is ecstatic to see her. He’s on the porch when she drives up on Friday afternoon, drinking a beer. He runs across the lawn to hug her.

“I missed you.” he says planting a kiss on the top of her head, and she thinks this is my true father, even though she will never say those words out loud. Too many bad memories of someone else, someone who didn’t actually earn that title. 

“Me too.”

She drops her bags off inside and can’t help but notice that the house is cleaner than it has been in years. 

Fred drags her to Pop’s right away, and she thinks about how much Jughead, connoisseur of all things diner would love it. 

When she says that outloud, Fred asks who Jughead is and Betty tells Fred about him. “So he’s a romantic interest then?” Fred says with a quirk of his eyebrow.

Betty almost coughs up the fry she’s eating. “Hell no. I told you I wasn’t dating in grad school. Besides he’s..” she searches around for the right word to convey what she wants to “very Archie about girls.”

Fred shakes his head “So you mean he gets around?”

Betty blushes. “Yes. Not that there’s anything wrong with that obviously, but it’s not for me.”

Fred smiles. “You know I was like that once.”

“Really?” Betty says. Fred’s made it clear even all these years later, that he still loves Mary, just not romantically. They’re one of those amicably divorced couples that still talk on the phone. 

Since they divorced, over a decade ago now, Fred has not really dated. She and Archie even tried to set him up a couple times, but he never went through with it. 

So this information, that he was once more casual about such things, shocked Betty.

“Oh, yeah. All through high school, college, even. Only then did I settle down with Mary.”

“But after?”

“Once I had really been in love - good, longtime love, that other stuff, the casual hook-up stuff, just didn’t appeal to me.”

Betty nods, “Still, Jughead’s just a friend.”

“But that in itself is progress.” Fred says with a shrug. 

“What? My best friend is male. Always has been, always will be.” Betty says. 

“But outside of Archie, that’s never really been the trend.”

Betty nods, there is no use denying it. Particularly to the man who raised her. “Jughead likes how honest I am which is a plus”

“Definitely.” Fred says with a smile, and a slurp of strawberry shake.

“So how about you tell me about your girlfriend?” 

“What? I don’t have a girlfriend!”

“Do you call her something else? Special lady? Gal pal? Because your house has not been that clean in years, and you’ve trimmed your beard. I know you didn’t do that for my sake. Either of those things. Besides I hear her voice sometimes in the background on video chat.”

Fred sighs, leans back against the booth. “Dammit. Never let your kid become a PI, yet another lesson I learned too late in life.”

Betty laughs, “What’s her name and when can I meet her?”

“Her name is Teresa, and I think I should tell Archie before I let you meet her.”

Betty whips out her phone and texts Archie the update. Seconds later she gets back a text message that says “Finally! Good 4 dad.” 

She shows it to Fred and he laughs, “OK. Fine, I will have her over for dinner tomorrow. As long as you bake cookies.”

Betty smiles happily, “Why didn’t you tell us. We’ve both wanted this for you for so long.”

Fred shrugs, “I know you did. I just didn’t want you guys to get too excited if it didn’t work out.”

“I get that. How long has it been going on for now?”

“Nine months.I was going to tell you and Archie the next time you were home together.”

“So Thanksgiving or Christmas?” Betty says, shaking her head with disbelief. “I’m glad I get to meet her now.”

The next day she and Fred go for a hike. They talk about all the silly small town gossip, grad school, and the construction business. Andrews Construction has been doing very well these last two years, a change of pace from the lean years that proceeded it. 

Fred barbeques burgers while Betty makes the cookies. Teresa walks over from her apartment in town. She’s beautiful and funny, and everything Archie and Betty ever hoped for for Fred. 

Teresa’s nervous at first and Betty gets that. The meet the family moment is never the easiest. But they are both readers so they fall into an easy conversation about authors and books. Teresa teaches English at Riverdale High, although she’s new there, so neither Archie or Betty took her class. 

After supper Betty video chats Archie in San Francisco. He’s thrilled to meet Teresa, even digitally. 

The next morning Betty has a hard time leaving. She always does. It’s not that she wants to live in Riverdale again, it’s far too small town for her, and everyone knows too much about her. But to drive away from Fred is always difficult. 

“I love you. You’re the best daughter ever, I want you to know that.” Fred says as they hug goodbye.

“You only say that because I’m the only daughter you have.” Betty pulls away with a smile. She feels so lucky in this moment. 

In Riverdale, the place where everyone knows the secret of her past, where there is no escaping the history of the house next door, everyone thinks of her as unlucky. She’s even heard the word cursed bandied about. 

But it’s silly, absurd even. She wishes the people who lived here, knew that. She was raised by such a wonderful father. It’s not like the history of what went before was erased. That would be impossible, but it was minimized in so many ways by the kindness of the man in front of her, and the one she was going to visit in two weeks. Her true family

“Thank you for raising me.” She says, not for the first time. Then she gets in the car. 

“Drive safely!” Fred calls out, his eyes gleaming a little, a smile on his face. “Call me when you get in.”

“Will do.” 

* * *

Jughead’s working the cash register today. He loves working at City Lights. He loves the way the bookstore feels, the layout, the regulars, and pretty much everything else about it. 

But even at the best jobs there are days that suck. He woke up late this morning, so he ate too little, too fast. Even though he’s had three cups of coffee, he still doesn’t feel fully awake.

Still he rings a new customer through, and gives them a smile. This afternoon he’s going to be working on sorting the back stock, and he’s looking forward to the quietness that comes with that job.

Pretending to be sociable when he’s not in the mood, is one of his least favorite things to do. It’s strange because he spends a lot of time with others, both at school and here. But at school, even with three roommates he has his own room to go into, his own door to lock. 

Not at Toni’s. She has a door that locks, he has a sofa. Privacy is something he hasn’t actually had in months. He can’t complain too much. The area she lives in Oakland, is nice enough, and the rents in San Francisco are terrifying. If he actually had to rent an apartment here, he couldn’t afford it. 

At least the place Archie’s crashing is only ten minutes or so from Toni’s, so they’ve been spending a fair amount of time together. Mostly at bars and coffee shops. 

It’s funny because in many ways, they don’t have a lot in common. Their biggest area of crossover are video games and music, but their taste in music is completely different. Archie is definitely into pop, with the occasional venture into hip hop, and Jughead is interested in anything but those two genres. But their taste in video games match. 

They both have Betty in common. Jughead thinks that he’s managed to steer his feelings for Betty back to the plutonic, but he’s not sure. For one thing, lately he hasn’t wanted to be with anyone. 

He goes through stages like that. Most of undergrad he was celibate, not for any particular reason but lack of interest. So he likes to think that his current period has nothing to with Betty and everything to do with the mysterious inner workings of his mind and body. Toni would claim otherwise though. 

Still Jughead’s careful about how he talks to Archie about Betty. This is her week in San Francisco. She flew in last night, but he’s not supposed to see her till his day off tomorrow. 

Jughead’s also trying really hard not to think about his manuscript too much. It’s in with the agent, and so far he hasn’t heard anything from them outside of the initial email response. 

Everyone has told him not to expect to hear anything till September, at the earliest, but it feels so hard to know that his manuscript, so much of his heart is just on some stranger’s laptop. A stranger who has the power to change his life, or not. 

Jughead hears an impatient foot tap and tries to work up an apology, while he focuses on the customers face, only to realize it’s Betty. She looks a little jet legged, and her hair is down, but it’s Betty.

“Holy shit.” He says, and suddenly he’s around the counter hugging her.

“It’s nice to see you too.” She says into his shirt. He pulls back.

“Are you here to see me?”

“No, the bookstore.” Betty says with a wink. “When’s your break?” 

“Half an hour.” Jughead says, already knowing the time will crawl till then.

“Good, that will give me a chance to browse first. I’ve always wanted to come here.” Jughead expects her to stick around the cash, but true to her word she disappears into the shelves. He doesn’t blame her, he had felt the same way when he had come here the first time. 

Fifteen minutes later he’s running a regulars credit card when a kid runs out the door, Betty is seconds behind the kid.

The kid (he is really more of a teenager, with green hair, and three arm tattoos), never had a chance. Within a few steps of the doorway of City Lights, Betty has the boy pinned to the sidewalk. Her arm against his back. She’s shouting something Jughead can’t hear through the window. The boy stands up slowly and hands Betty three books.

Jughead glances at the regular he’s checking out, and she is as caught up in all this as he is. Jughead considers going out, but Betty’s too quick for that, she’s already re-entering the store with four books in her hand. All new hardcovers.

“He won’t be back.” Betty says, laying them down on the counter. “But I got a picture of him you can print if you want it.”

“Thank you.” Jughead says.

The regular, an older women named Rosemary, looks at Betty with admiration, “That was bad-ass. You looked like you do that all the time.”

“She does.” Jughead supplies, “She moonlights as an in-store detective. Just not here.”

Rosemary smiles and takes the receipt from Jughead’s hand and scoops up the book from the counter. “Good job, in any case.”

Jughead can’t help but notice that Betty has flushed bright red. He’s always known that she doesn’t handle compliments well, but he’s never seen her look quite so overwhelmed by them.

“Thank you.” Betty says, and Rosemary leaves, but not before sending Jughead a wink. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause a scene. I just couldn’t let him get away with doing that to such a wonderful store. On your watch no less.”

Jughead smiles, “Everyone needs a little excitement every once in a while. Speaking of excitement, I’m going to go get the manager because it’s time for us to swap out so I can take my break.”

“Good. I’ll just put the books back.” Betty says.

“Only if you re-shelve them properly.”

“Do you think that little of me, Jones?”

“Never.” He says, and means it, “I’m just teasing.”

Jughead gets his manager. He probably should tell Robert about the robbery Betty had just foiled, but he doesn’t want to delay their lunch any longer.

They head out to a nearby Vietnamese sandwich place that had become Jughead’s go to lunch place.

He was worried that after time apart their conversation would grow stifled, or awkward, but that wasn’t the case at all. Neither did he feel any sort of romantic strain.

Things were comfortable between them, normal. Lots of literary jokes and verbal jabs. Time spent with her passed far too quickly. 

She left to meet Archie at the pier, and Jughead returned to the bookstore and his delayed explanation of events to his boss. 

The rest of the day felt like a slog, but the next morning he woke up feeling a little like it was Christmas. He’s excited to show Betty the city he’s gotten to know, even if most of the places are ones she would have found on her own. 

They get breakfast at Tartine before heading to the MoMa, and then the Ferry Terminal, and somehow the whole day has passed. He wishes he had thought ahead and planned on having dinner, just the two of them, but instead, on Toni’s insistence, they are all meeting up in Rockridge for pizza and beer. 

Betty and he arrive first, snagging a coveted spot on the patio, and they are deep into a discussion on what Betty’s plans for the literary journal this year are, when Toni shows up. 

The girls hug, and Betty admires Toni’s newly teal hair, and they are just getting back into the swing of conversation when Archie arrives. Archie and Toni have actually spent a fair amount of the summer together, thanks to Jughead. They’d never hung out on their own, but they would often spend evenings, here or somewhere near here, with him. 

Jughead was surprised at how well the two of them got along, and when he pointed that out to Toni, Toni looked at him like he was crazy “Why wouldn’t he? He’s a nice guy. And we have completely different taste in women.” Jughead couldn’t help but laugh at that. Only after Toni had pointed that out, did he realize that they were each others wing person in social situations. 

Even though Jughead is close to Betty, at school she rarely interacts with his larger group of friends. Part of that is the simple fact that he’s no longer as close them as he was at the start of first year. But the other is that the few times Betty has sat down to eat lunch with them, it’s been a little uncomfortable. 

Jughead isn’t socially adept enough to know if that’s on Betty’s end or the groups. But here everyone is comfortable with each other. They tease each other while eating pizza, and then Archie talks about how at work today he was supposed to be a PA for a formerly famous rock star, and it sucked in every way.

There was Bocce set up in the back of the patio, and Toni talked Archie into a game after dinner, and once again Jughead and Betty were together alone. Sometimes it seemed unimaginable that a year ago he’d never met Betty, that six months ago he didn’t really know Betty. She felt like someone he had known his whole life now. 

Maybe it was the great day, the good mood, the pizza, and the beer getting to him, but right now he cannot imagine any scenario in which he would feel better than he did right now. He felt so full of happiness and light. 

Betty looks happy too. Leaning back in her chair, lazily watching Toni and Archie play Bocce on the other side of the patio.

“I wish the rest of my summer had been more like this.” Betty says softly. 

“Mine kind of was.” Jughead says, “Although it could have used more you in it.”

“I think all the paperwork kind of ate into my soul. But the good news is i’ve made solid in roads on distributing the literary journal.”

“Oh” Jughead says, raising one eyebrow. 

“I actually got distribution in the in-state Barnes & Nobles.”

“What!?” Jughead has heard how hard it is to get anything into a brick and mortar store these days, particularly a literary journal published by a rotating staff of graduate students, so he knows this is a huge coup. 

“I just wore them down. It helps of course, that i’ve become friends with the local manager of the one I PI at.”

“And to think my first impression of you was that you were an outsider.” Jughead says with a shake of his head. He just means it as a throw away comment, but he can tell by the expression on Betty’s face that she is not interpreting it as one. So he starts talkings more “I mean you only really seemed friendly to Kay and Mia…”

“I was.” Betty says with a shrug.

“I mean my first impression of you was that you kind of hated men.” 

A look Jughead has difficulty interpreting crosses Betty’s face, and then she speaks. “You’re not the first person to say that. Archie’s jock friends in high school all claimed that I terrified them so much they wouldn’t hang out upstairs. Although honestly I think that was just an excuse so they could all get high in the garage.”

Jughead laughs. He can picture that easily somehow, even though he’s never even seen a photo of their childhood home.

“It’s funny because I was raised by men, and I love both Andrews more than pretty much anyone, ever. But outside of that I have real trust issues. And before you ask, it wasn’t Archie’s high school friends who pointed that out, but a therapist. More than one.”

“Why?” Jughead asks. Betty rarely talks her past with him. Books and movies they can spend hours talking about easily, but personal things like this are rarely mentioned and if they are it is in a carefully selected way.

“It’s a long story, but I will tell you sometime.” Betty sends him a soft smile. 

“I’m going to hold you to that Cooper.”

“Good.”

* * *

It’s a week before school starts, but most of the second years are back already. Starting up their on-campus jobs or meeting with their thesis advisors before everything gets crazy. Because of this, Betty has scheduled the first Literary Journal meeting of the year. Editors only. 

She’s actually taken care of a lot of the work this summer on her own, but the next round will depend on the genre editors. Kay is her non-fiction editor, Jughead is her fiction editor, and Kevin, the person she knows the least, is her poetry editor. 

She’s booked a room with big windows in the graduate studies building, overlooking the lawn, for all afternoon. She has planned for this day for a long time. She made lunch in advance and scheduled two coffee deliveries from campus catering. There should be nothing stopping the various editors from staying focused and on topic. 

Kevin arrives first, wearing all black. She doesn’t know him well, but she’s heard him read on several occasions. She’s not sure his writing actually lived up to the hype it has, but she’s not a poet. 

He asks her about her summer, tells her a bit about his, and then launches in to what almost feels like a lecture, about all the summer gossip. Included in the update is the fact that Jughead spent the summer with his San Francisco based girlfriend. 

Betty does not bother to correct him about the nature of Jughead’s relationship with Toni, but she can’t wipe the smirk off her face when she hears that little bit of news. Kevin sits up right in his chair and says “I guess the rumors are true. You’ve befriended the campus rebel.”

Betty shrugs, as rebel is really is not the most accurate term for Jughead, and then Kevin continues his ongoing update about someone in the poetry department that Betty maybe knows in passing. 

Thankfully Kay arrives a minute after that, looking tanned and relaxed. Betty actually spent last night with Kay, newly home from Spain, so they’d already caught up, mostly. But still she was relieved to see her there, and the two share a warm hug, till Kevin takes it upon himself to continue the gossip update. 

Betty glances at her watch. Jughead is now officially a half hour late, which isn’t like him at all. She can’t do anything but start the meeting without him. 

Betty hates doing this, but she does. She calls them to order and they start with talking about the number of subscribers and how they can increase that number. Betty knows Jughead can’t contribute much to this particular conversation, and she has to say she’s impressed by Kevin’s contribution. 

After that Betty has no choice but discuss solicited submissions. Each genre will solicit three established authors to submit work with the guarantee that this work is accepted. It is a common practice for literary journals, particularly academic ones. 

The only problem with it is that sometimes if you ask too famous an author they would unload a story on you that otherwise wouldn’t get published for good reason. If you asked an author who wasn’t established enough, their name wouldn’t help sell copies of the journal. 

Kevin presented his list first. Betty suspected that everyone on it would respond, and with decent poems too, because he implied he was friends with all of them already. A personal connection always helped. 

Kay presented her list, and Betty had a lot of opinions about it. One of the writers was very established, but a little notorious. He wrote an entire book about the agony of sleeping with two famous women. Betty felt uncomfortable reading it, mostly because the women don’t know about each other until one of them gets pregnant with his baby. She didn’t really want to publish work along those lines. But Kevin and Kay had no issues with it. 

 

It would be helpful for Jughead to weigh in on this, but it was almost lunchtime now, and he still wasn’t there. 

Betty finally allows Kay to proceed and contact the author with conditions surrounding what they would publish. Both Kay and Kevin seem really excited about that. That is when Jughead finally showed up. He was out of breath and sweat was streaming down his face. 

He surprised Betty by hoisting her out of her seat and into a hug. Betty wonders if he’s drunk but then he lets go of her and says “Sorry I’m late. I just signed with an agent, all thanks to you.”

“Congratulations!!!” Betty replies as he lets her go. “That is so exciting.”

Kevin’s jaw actually goes slack, but before he even says anything in response he’s typing something into his phone. Betty’s sure he is already spreading gossip about this, so Betty meets Jughead’s gaze and flicks her head towards Kevin to make sure he’s aware of the situation. Jughead just shrugs a huge smile still on his face.

“Normally I would have texted you to tell you I would be late, but I hated the idea that you would find out that way. Plus I thought I was going to be here half an hour ago, but there was an accident on the track.” Jughead says. “So sorry. It will not happen again.”

Kay smiles and shakes her head. “It’s a pretty understandable excuse. Congratulations Jughead.”

“Yes, indeed.” Kevin adds. 

Jughead sits down next to Betty and says. “We can talk about details over lunch. Where were we?”

With that Betty manages to steer them all back on track. The whole meeting, lunch included passes quickly. It feels like the whole time there is a hum in her heart that says we did it, we did it, we did it. 

After the meeting is finally over Kay rushes out for a date with Mia, and Kevin sticks around for a bit. Almost like he’s snooping. But Jughead and Betty stop talking entirely, till he picks up the hint and leaves. 

As soon as he goes, Betty can’t help herself from hugging Jughead again. She wants to be close to him. To share this victory, she played a part in. 

“I owe you dinner.” Jughead says, when she pulls back. “Are you free?”

“Yes.” She says, her heart beat feeling a little off for a second there, but she’s quick to remind herself, that this is just a friend. A friend saying thank you. “I’m so proud of you.” Betty says as they make their way to the fancy Italian restaurant he’s picked. 

“I haven't sold the book yet. This is just an agent. Agents can fail to place manuscripts. They do so all the time.”

“Not this one.” Betty says. “Your manuscript will be a book. In stores within two years I bet.”

Jughead turns towards her, pausing in his walking for a second to say “That’s pretty cocky Betty Cooper.”

Her face feels incapable of smiling any bigger, “I just feel very right about this one!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the next chapter will probably be super long, but because for once I don’t have any oneshots on the go (probably), I’m hoping to get to it in a timely fashion. 
> 
> Comments are very much appreciated!


	5. Second Year, First Quarter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a heads up: there is a description of graphic violence/character death in this chapter. It is all in the past, but if that’s not for you, you can skim past it.

Betty’s sitting in the cafeteria before the welcome BBQ starts. She likes spending time in here, because there is good light, plenty of space and the graduate students tend to steer clear of it. 

A group of undergraduates are one table over, but they are quite enough. She’s able to concentrate on the notes she’s making. The BBQ is important to her, because she wants to be actually welcoming, and not intimidating, and even more significantly, she needs to recruit readers for the literary journals. The more readers they recruit today, the more likely they are to have enough help when it comes down to the actual work of the journal. 

She reviews her talking points about the journal. The new students should already know how helpful it is to have experiences like this one under their belts, but it never hurts to point that out. 

“Jughead Jones just signed with an agent. He’s definitely the second year most likely to land on the NYT’s Bestseller list.” A loud steady voice declares. Betty doesn’t have to look up. She knows it’s Kevin Keller talking. Still she looks over slowly to see who he is talking too. It’s a group of three overdressed women - first years. 

She wonders what else Kevin will say if she keeps her mouth shut, but she decides honesty is the best policy, and she waves at him. She can see the shock in his eyes, when he registers who is waving, but he walks over with the group, a smile plastered on his face. Betty’s not sure if it is real or not.

Betty puts her pen and notebook away quickly, and grabs her purse. She doesn’t know how long this will take and she knows the BBQ has already started.

“This is Betty Cooper.” Kevin says, before introducing the three first years behind him. “Betty runs the Literary Journal with me. So if you are interested in asking her any questions about that please do.”

Betty smiles, and answers all their questions before excusing herself. She’s a little curious as to how Kevin will describe her once she leaves, but she also is kind of relieved she doesn’t have to hear it. 

By the time she reaches the BBQ, it is in full swing. Betty is glad to see Kay and Mia chatting with Prof. Howe near the fountain. One of Jughead’s friends, Matt, who Betty has kind of gotten to know, is manning the actual BBQ. Jughead is already there, and not surprisingly surrounded by a whole gaggle of girls. He’s eating a burger and nodding when Betty passes him on the way to the chips. 

She’s surprised by the fact that he immediately leaves the group of women to follow her. 

“Found any new readers Jones?” Betty asks.

“Five so far. Two fiction, three poetry.” He says.

“Good start.” Betty replies and then she feels someone’s arm wrap around her waist. She turns and there’s Mia. She saw her two days ago, but still it feels great to see her again. She gives her a big hug. They exchange quick minutia about their various summers before Professor Howe drags Jughead off, to meet an incoming student. 

“Met anyone interesting so far?” Betty asks

Mia shakes her head “No one as interesting as you and Kay at least. But you never know, first impressions are sometimes wrong.”

“Tell me about it. I kind of hated Jughead on sight.” 

“A year changes everything.” Mia says with a laugh. “I thought you and Kay were going to date, and I had a crush on Jughead, and now i’m dating Kay, and you’re seeing Jughead.”

Betty feels a little bit of shock go through her. Certainly Mia doesn’t think that she’s dating Jughead. She’s never said that. “No, i’m not. Jug and I are platonic.”

“Yet you call him Jug.” Mia says raising an eyebrow. “You can tell me. I’m well and truly over him.”

“No, no. He’s just a good friend. Like you.”

“You didn’t visit me over this summer?” Mia says, but she doesn’t seem upset at all. Just curious, banter-ey. 

“I visited Archie over the summer. Jughead was in the same city. Plus San Francisco is a whole lot more convenient to get to then Spain.”

Mia nods. “Ok, I believe you. But if things change, tell me. I’m good. I have Kay now.”

“And I’m glad.” Betty says with a smile, “even though I hate the fact that I’m now the third wheel.”

Mia shrugs “Get used to it.”

“We are actually supposed to talk to the incoming students at this.”

Mia nods, and they spot a shy looking first year alone by the food table and approach her. The rest of the evening passes quickly. Betty manages to convince ten people to attend the literary journal’s orientation meeting, so that’s a good start. 

The whole time at the BBQ and then later at the pub when she and Jughead throw darts, she gets a sense of how much the dynamics have changed. Last year she wanted to be on the outside, and this time if she wanted to stay Jughead’s friend it appeared that she wouldn’t stay there. 

She was going to the washroom in a stall, when two drunk girls burst into the Ladies room. She doesn’t recognize their voices at all. 

“I can’t believe he turned me down. Who does he think he is?”

“Jughead fucking Jones.” the other voice said. “He turned a lot of women down tonight. It’s not like last year.”

The women both enter the stalls, and Betty hastily exits hers, washing her hands thoroughly but swiftly, and exiting before they can spot her. She wonders briefly what is going on with Jughead, but she shakes it from her mind. If he wants to tell her, he will.

 

Prof. Lucy Green is part of why Betty applied to the program in the first place. She’s thrilled to be in her class. Over the moon in every way, till she actually attends it. Before the class even starts Prof. Green has snarled at three students. 

But thankfully over the next few lectures it becomes clear that while Prof. Green is mad at most of the class, Betty is not on her shitlist. 

It turns out that while Prof. Green is a wonderful, lyrical, thoughtful writer, and a decent critic in terms of most feedback, she’s a pretty terrible human being. Moody and demanding. She has required student meetings every three weeks, one on one in her office. They are apparently akin to emotional torture sessions.

One student’s three page essay is ripped apart, the actual paper destroyed, except for one single sentence. Everyone cries in their one on one meetings.

Betty steels herself for her meeting, wearing her favorite outfit, as if somehow that will help. 

Prof. Green hands an essay of Betty’s back to her as soon as Betty sits down. There are no notes scrawled on it. Betty wonders what it could possibly mean. 

Then she looks up and meets Prof. Green’s eyes.

“I read your essay.” Prof. Green says. “And I thought this is terrific research, thoughtfully presented. I’d never read anything so insightful about gun ownership and mental illness.”

“Thank you.” Betty says, although for some reason she feels nervous. Like she can sense a However hovering just out of view. 

“Then I looked you up online. At first I just found a couple of the articles you’d written over the years. Then I googled your full name, not your author name, and the words gun violence”

That fucking bitch is the only sentence Betty can think, it keeps repeating in her head. 

Prof. Green actually turns her laptop to face Betty and Betty feels beyond angry. Furious actually. There on the screen is the cover of People’s Magazine with a newly 18 year old Betty on it. She goes by Elizabeth on the cover. 

It’s not like she’s ashamed of this. It is is a decision she still stands by. It is why Fred has the house, why he owns it outright. It’s also how Archie and she got through undergrad debt free. 

Still it was a steep price to pay, to have ones biggest secret splashed across the cover of a national weekly. That said, no one has ever recognized Betty from it. No one in undergrad ever brought it up to her. Everyone in Riverdale already knew the story.

“And?” Betty says. She doesn’t want to antagonize Prof. Green. It’s not like she knows where she is going with this. 

“Why do you not mention in your essay how gun ownership and mental illness affected you personally?” Prof. Green says.

“Because it wasn’t relevant. My personal situation doesn’t add anything to the essay that isn’t already there. Besides my father never received a diagnosis. Saying he was mentally ill, is just speculating after the fact.”

“I disagree. It gives the reader someone to connect with, to empathize with. You seem to be determined not to write about this. You lived an experience lots of people would love to read about it and you’re just hogging it all for yourself.”

Betty can’t get over her word choice. How terrible. To think of not sharing a traumatic event as hogging. Any therapist Betty has seen over the last decade, and she has seen a lot, would have a field day with that.

“It was my experience. I don’t owe anyone anything.”

“Yet you were willing to talk to People about this?” Prof. Green says with a raised eyebrow, leaning in towards Betty. Betty sits even more stiffly.

“It wasn’t my first choice, no, but they paid well, and my adopted family needed money. I was in the position to give them what they needed. Besides the reporters were actually very respectful, discerning.” Unlike you, Betty thinks.

“And now you have enough money?” 

“Yes.” Betty says, even though what she is thinking, is how rude can this women get?

“Look, I want you to get a good grade in this class. But I don’t think you can really do that without writing about this event.” Prof. Green actually has the audacity to have a smile on her face.

Betty is not on the verge of tears, but screaming “Look, you’re behaving in a very unprofessional way. What you are suggesting is extortion. Besides, I have therapy to help me move on. It’s not like i’m stewing in silence.”

“But your readers will miss out on something vital.” Prof. Green says. 

Betty is reminded suddenly of her conversations with Jughead last quarter. But that situation was very different. He was writing something personal and keeping one aspect of that to himself, even though that aspect affected the story over all. 

Betty wasn’t writing about herself, she was writing about a much larger issue, one she happened to have experience. But her experience was not fundamentally different than what the essay already contained. 

“I disagree.” Betty says. She stands up. 

“Our meeting isn’t over.” 

“It is for me. Look i’m a good student. A good writer. I’m open to criticism, but I don’t need to be bullied. I will think about what you said. I promise you that.”

“Ok.” Prof. Green says, and she starts to say something else, but Betty’s already halfway out the door, and she’s not interested in listening. 

Betty already ran this morning, but now her body is so full of adrenalin and she has to do something with that, so she decides to go running again. Outside this time. 

She goes to her apartment, changes quickly, puts on her angriest playlist and starts to run. She’s four miles in and dripping in sweat when someone calls her name. She looks towards the voice and there on his bike, which he has pulled to a stop, is Jughead.

Betty stops, “Hi.”

“Didn’t you already run today?” He had been at the gym, working rather than working out.

“Yes, but then I had a meeting with Prof. Green and she pissed me off so much, that I had to do something. These seemed healthier then punching a wall.”

Jughead laughs. “Fair enough. Do you want to talk about it?”

Betty’s already cooling down, just standing there. 

“Sure. I’ll run back to my place, you can drive over, and we can share a bottle of wine.”

“It’s three in the afternoon.” 

“If you pick up pizza on the way, I will pay you back, and we will just call it an early dinner.”

Jughead grins and flips one of the curls out of his eyes. “Fine by me then. I just don’t want to become those cliche writers who drink at all hours.”

He puts lightness into his tone, but Betty knows it is a serious issue for him. He’s always careful about how much he drinks and when. Having edited his manuscript, she’s aware of why, or at least, one of the obvious reasons.

She gets it. She had spent most of her life trying to avoid the sins of her father. 

“You don’t have to drink. Hell, I don’t have to. We can just split pizza.” Betty says.

“No, no. I’m on board now. Forgot I ever said anything.” 

Betty nods. “Meet you at my place.”

“Sure thing.” He says, starting his motorcycle. 

She runs back home as quickly and directly as possible. Betty knows where Jughead is picking up pizza. There is only one place in town that he’s deemed worthy of his patronage. An old school Sicilian place called Jimmy’s. Their pizza’s are exceptional but their turn around time is not. Which is good for Betty, because she needs a shower. She takes one, and has changed into leggings and a loose sweater by the time Jughead drops by with the pizza. It’s almost 4, and Betty has no problem opening the bottle of red wine and pouring them each a glass. 

They each eat a piece on the sofa before she can even talk. She wants to get all her thoughts in order. After all there is no way she can tell Jughead why she is so upset without telling him her whole story. 

At this point in their friendship, it’s inevitable. It’s not something she can leave out of her life story forever, after all she knows most of his dark secrets, has for some time now. Kay and Mia know. 

She knows that people can Google her, can find these things out for themself, but it’s not easy. It’s far from the first thing to come up. Besides it was one thing for Prof. Green to look her up, it was something else entirely for her to try to force Betty to write about what happened. 

Jughead is the one that ends up breaking the silence “So what exactly did Prof. Green do this time?”

Betty’s already told her about how Prof. Green bullied people in class, so Jughead’s knows she’s not the nicest person.

“She found out about my tragic backstory.” Betty says with a shrug. 

“How? What?” Jughead says, and Betty is wondering if he is asking her what her tragic backstory is exactly. But then she decides she has to stop obsessing about the details, about controlling her story. She has to say the truth and he will react to it however he is going to react to it. 

In the past not everyone had reacted well. She’d lost friendships over this, had people ghost her, or just treat her differently. She felt like if anyone would understand it was him. It was not as if his upbringing was standard either. 

“She found out by googling my full name and the search term gun violence. Why she decided to do this exactly is a little beyond me, but she did.”

Jughead’s facial expression was a surprising mixture of concern and curiosity. 

“And I thought I was the only one whose past involved a lot of guns.” Jughead said with a shrug. “not that I fired one or anything.” Betty nods, running guns across the border was the key way Jughead’s former gang made money. 

“It’s a long story.” 

“Ok. I’m up for that, if you are.” Jughead says. 

Betty takes a sip of her wine. “My mom got pregnant when my parents were in high school. My dad wanted my mom to get an abortion. Instead she went away, had the child and then put him up for adoption. His name was Chic. It turns out the adoption didn’t work out, that he bounced around between foster homes, and somehow my mom found out, and took him in when he was 18.”

“How old were you?’ Jughead asks.

“Nine. We didn’t know about his existence till suddenly Chic was living with us. Polly and I were shocked.”

“Who’s Polly?”

“My sister.”

“I thought you didn’t have a sister.”

“She died a long time ago.” Betty says, and Jughead nods, he is so focused, so full of thought, it is almost hard to look at it. He’s trying to put the story together without all the pieces. Betty has to give him all the pieces. 

“My parents really fought about him living with us. My dad had always been a little strange. Or so people tell me. I don’t remember any of this all that well. I was young, and the trauma around it, didn’t help. But when Chic moved in my dad got more paranoid. He started wearing a gun in a holster around the house.”

Jughead mutters “Holy shit.” under his breath. 

“I don’t know exactly what happened, no one does, but Polly, my mom, and I were out shopping and when we came back Chic was dead on the floor. My dad stood over him with a gun. I remember parts of this really clearly. There was so much blood.”

Betty stops, takes a sip of water instead of wine, and then she takes a deep breath. 

“My mom starts screaming and my dad says something like ‘This will shut you up’ and he shoots her.” Betty’s told this story more than she wants to but she’s never not cried at this part. 

“Polly just stands there and I, I run for the door fling it open and run for Arche’s house. They were our next door neighbors at the time. Fred was on the front lawn, destroying an old tree with a chainsaw. I don’t remember this part, but he does. He looks up and sees me, and then he sees my dad exit the front door with the gun. That’s when he takes his ear protectors off. That’s how he missed the gunshots in the first place.”

Betty takes another sip of water “This is when the miracle happens. Fred gets between my dad and I. My dad is ranting but Fred starts to talk him down somehow and then my dad shoots himself. Polly was apparently killed right after my mother. I was the only survivor, and only because of Fred”.

She meets Jughead’s eyes and they are liquid. Filled with tears, but nothing is falling. “I am so sorry.”

“You can see why I don’t talk about it.”

Jughead nods. “Yes, I mean there was lots of violence in my childhood, obviously, but nothing like that.”

“Anyways.” Betty says, taking a deep breath. “Prof. Green did some research on me, and found out about it and thinks I have to write about it.”

“No. Why?”

“Because I write about gun violence already. She thinks I’m denying readers a human angle.”

“Screw her.” Jughead snarls, and for the first time in the year they’ve known each other Betty sees the gang leader side of Jughead. She can feel the potential for violence, in him, in his hands that have balled into fists. “How can she think she has that right?”

“I don’t know but she thinks she does. She threatened to fail me if I don’t, but I pointed out that was extortion.”

“That bitch.”

The pizza has long been abandoned and Betty wished she had started this conversation after they ate. Now it was all cold. 

They manage to transition back to eating though. Jughead occasionally tossing out insults aimed at Prof. Green, then he suggests that Betty switch classes. But Betty doesn’t want to do that. She feels too stubborn to do that. Besides all the best teachers now have full classes. 

Still she is grateful for his input, for the fact that he’s here, with her, that he listened to her, that he responded in a way that didn’t make her feel judged, or fragile, or anything other than listened to. 

He leaves around midnight after long conversations about anything but her family, anything but Prof. Green.

Later that night, just as Betty is falling asleep she gets a text from Archie saying “Did you tell Jug about your fam?”

She texted back “Yes. Why?”

She watches as the three dots move on the screen and then the answer arrives “He texted me Tell your dad thank U.” Betty smiles.

* * *

A month after Betty tells Jughead about her past, the whole campus knows. He kept his mouth shut of course, but Prof. Green brings it up in class, she tells everyone about Betty’s past as if it is appropriate to lecture on the private lives of students. 

Jughead finds out while he’s eating lunch with Matt. A girl they’re both casually friendly with, Claire, comes over and tells them the news as if it is exciting. It takes all of Jughead’s will not to pound the table, kick it over. 

He texts Betty immediately, to see how she is and she texts back that Fred is driving up, so she will be busy the next few days. 

Then a few minutes later she asks him to come by her place two nights from now for dinner. She says Kay and Mia are coming too. Jughead agrees immediately. He hates that he’s not going to see her till then, though. 

The days pass slowly. He runs into Kay at a coffee show and she asks Jughead if Betty’s reported Prof. Green to the Dean, and Jughead confesses that he knows no more than she does. He doesn’t think so though. If this had happened to someone else, Betty would be the first to report it. But he doesn’t think she would do this for herself. He wonders if the school, the actual formal part of it, knows anything about it. 

He considers reporting it himself, but since he wasn’t there he doesn’t exactly make the most convincing witness. He’s spent enough time with Betty, the avid researcher, to know that he is a tertiary source. 

Jughead just tries to focus on his own work. But it’s hard. He keeps thinking he’ll hear that Prof. Green got fired, or at the very least reprimanded, but there isn’t even a formal apology that he hears of.

Finally it’s time to go to Betty’s house for supper. He can’t help but feel nervous when he knocks. He doesn’t have an easy or close relationship with his own father. He still visits him twice a year in prison, but those meetings are always stiff and uncomfortable. Jughead never knows what to say and his dad sort of mutters about who won what poker game for smokes, till it’s time for Jughead to go.

He knows his dad is proud of him for getting out. Not that he’s out entirely. The Serpents Jacket is still in his closet, and he keeps in touch with Sweet Pea and Fangs, who are still in. 

For the four years Jughead was in the Serpents properly, a month never passed where he wasn’t involved in violence. Now it had been years. He wondered if Fred knew anything about his past. It’s not like Jughead was just Betty’s friend, he was Archie’s as well. Fred probably knew more about him then he was comfortable with. 

Jughead briefly considers leaving. After all the door still hasn’t opened. But he needs to see Betty, he needs to make it clear that he supports her. 

Finally the door opens. A man with soft eyes opens it and extends his hand “You must be Jughead. I’m Fred.”

“Hi Fred.” Jughead says, shaking his hand and then following him inside. The apartment smells like garlic bread, which is to say heaven and he takes a deep inhale before closing the door behind him. 

Betty’s in the kitchen tossing a salad, when she looks up. She is beautiful. Her hair is back in a bun and she’s wearing a shade of blue that compliments her skin and eyes. But mostly she looks happy. Not like someone whose past was just disclosed against her will. 

That fills Jughead with relief. He was worried that this whole thing had been devastating, but Betty seems like herself. 

“I’m glad you two can meet.” Betty says. “Jug, Kay just texted me, Mia is sick and she’s staying with her to nurse her back to health.”  
“Ok.” Jughead says feeling a little nervous. It’s not like he really like he really likes Kay or Mia. He’s more neutral on them, but he likes the idea of the buffer they would provide with Fred. Now it’s just him. 

“So Betty told me you signed with an agent?” Fred asks. Jughead nods. “I was too embarrassed to ask her, but can you tell me what that means. I thought agents were for actors.”

Jughead laughs. He can see how Fred is related to Archie. Than Jughead goes into how publishing works. The rest of the time passes quickly before Betty finishes supper, lasagna as it turns out, and puts it all on the table.

They sit down and dig in. Jughead’s feeling more comfortable now. Fred is easy to be around. He’s down to earth like Archie, but more perceptive, like Betty. He’s also a pretty straight shooter. Jughead wonders if Betty gets that from him, or if it was something her biological parents had. 

Still it’s halfway through the meal and no one has brought up the elephant in the room. Jughead’s about to, when Betty finally says. “So, Proff. Green is an asshole.”

“Agreed. But what exactly happened? I mean people in her class have told me things, but I just didn’t know who to trust.”

“We were workshopping an essay of mine, it wasn’t even about gun violence, and she brought it up, as if it was a fact. She said that I was hiding my past from my fellow students and that was not something a real author would do.”

To Jughead’s left Fred shakes his head. His mouth full of garlic bread. Even though he clearly knows all this already. 

“How did the class react?” Jughead ask. 

“It’s interesting. I’m not close to anyone in that class particularly, but within a few minutes everyone seemed to be on my side. Prof. Green actually apologized in the class, and one student who was particularly upset on my behalf, his name was Lucas, made everyone promise not to tell about what happened. Although that clearly didn’t happen.”

Jughead knew Lucas, but probably no better than Betty did. He was a regular at the gym too, although mostly in the evening. He was a rower. A tall blond with lean muscle. Jughead had never formed an opinion of him really, although now he liked him.

“Did you report Prof. Green?” Jughead asks.

“No, Lucas did. The dean said she took the complaint seriously but she didn’t really have grounds to fire Prof. Green on because Prof. Green was able to find out all that information about me by herself. If I had told Prof. Green it would have counted as a breach of information, but clearly I didn’t.” 

“Shouldn’t you go to a lawyer just in case?”

“Mary, Fred’s ex-wife, is a lawyer, and while the whole situation pissed her off, she said that legally speaking the Dean was right.”

“Oh. You are handling this so much better than I thought possible.”

Fred laughs. 

“I was a bit of a mess when Fred arrived. But he helped. He reminded me that everyone in Riverdale knows about it already. If I was ever to really start publishing my work in a serious way, it would get out, so he encouraged me write about it.”

“Is that what you were busy doing?” Jughead asks

“Mostly. I mean Fred and I went hiking and to the movies, but most of the time I spent writing an article, about what privacy means. About what happened to me, and what Prof. Green did, in terms of disclosing my information.”

“And you like how it’s going?” Jughead says. He knows the expression on Betty’s face. He’s seen it before.

“It makes me nervous. But I’d rather control how the information was released than not. But the article itself, I think it’s going to change my career.”

“Really?” Jughead says raising an eyebrow.

“I sent a pitch to The New Yorker. The non-fiction editor has already responded to me. He tentatively agreed to publish it, based on what I sent him.”

Jughead feels this rush of joy. This is it. That is the one publication that could make a writers career. Most authors, hell even most of their professors receive more rejections from The New Yorker than any other publication. They’d rejected Jughead five times so far. 

Jughead has gotten used to feeling mixed emotions when he hears of the good news his fellow students receive. They are competitive, even if they’re friends, they are all trying to make it in the same limited field. 

But with Betty’s good news, he feels nothing but happy. “Betty that is incredible. So this is actually a celebratory dinner, but you buried the lead.”

Betty shrugs. “Yes. I guess. It’s not a real acceptance till they say yes to the finished product, and I still have at least a week worth of work till the essay is finished, but still it feels like a step forward.”

“It really is. I mean it’s the gucking New Yorker!” Jughead says.

Betty laughs “See that’s why I had to tell you. When I told Fred and Archie, they were like - What is the New Yorker.”

Fred blushes “I went on google after. I understand what it is now. I even bought a copy at the grocery store.”

“It’s ok. My dad has no clue what the New Yorker is either.”

“Now, I feel a little better.” Fred says with a smile “I never planned to raise two writer.”

“My dad didn’t raise me at all, and I still turned out that way. So we could have a whole nature versus nurture argument if we wanted to.

“Let’s not.” Betty says with a smile, as she gets up to get dessert. 

Jughead gets up to help clear the table but Betty waves him off and he sits back down

“Betty told me about your manuscript. It sounded interesting. How on earth did you come up with the idea?” Fred asks. 

“I lived it.” Jughead says, casually, before realizing who he is saying this to. This is the parent of one of his best friends. Betty must have not included that fact when she told Fred about the novel, but he could understand why. He’s a little uncomfortable with the book being published for that reason.

“Oh.” Fred says. “Even the gun running, and the knife fights?”

“It’s based on his experience, Fred. It’s not a memoir.” Betty says diplomatically. But because Jughead is who he is, and because it might come out in an interview Fred sees someday, and Jughead always plans to be in Betty’s life, Jughead shakes his head. 

“I mean it’s not exactly what happened, but it’s close. I’ve definitely run guns, and I’ve been in a number of knife fights.” Jughead says, rolling up his sleeve and showing one of his scars to Fred. To his surprise the man doesn’t recoil. He just nods. “But I left that life behind five years ago, and I will never return to it.”

“And it was that easy? Just get up and leave?” Fred asks, incredulous.

It’s funny because when Jughead was in the thick of the gang, when he believed that being involved it was the same as having family, having purpose, to leave seemed like an impossible betrayal. But when he got into college in another state, everyone was supportive. Happy to see him go almost. Back home he was a surprising success story, not the person who abandoned his friends. 

“It was actually.” Jughead says as Betty sets a slice of pie down in front of him. “I had a real job by then, stocking groceries, and I was no longer leading things, anyhow. Everyone kind of felt like it was time.”

Jughead takes a bite of the pie and discovers it’s apple. The perfect mixture of tart and sweet. 

“Why did you step down from leading the gang?”

“It’s sort of a long story, and i’m not sure how much Betty told you, but basically my dad went to jail, after he was charged with murder, and I looked into the crime and managed to clear him of the murder charge. That is what the book focuses on.”

“It focuses on solving a crime rather than committing one?” Fred raises an eyebrow.

“Exactly. Clearing my dad of the murder wasn’t enough though. My dad’s still in jail. But after that, some of the older guys in the group took pity on me, or something. Maybe it was just gratitude, and they slowly talked me out of the leadership position. At the time I was a little pissed, but now I’m just grateful. They prevented me from following in my father’s footsteps.”

Fred nods, “So I shouldn’t worry about you dragging Betty into a life of petty crime?”

“I don’t think anyone could drag Betty into anything.”

Fred laughs and shakes his head. “I can see why my kids like you.” Jughead’s relieved, by that sentence. It feels a bit like a gift. The friends he grew up with didn’t really have parents, at least not in the involved, traditional sense of the word. So to be approved of by Fred meant something to him. 

He shot a look in Betty’s direction and Betty grinned back, before digging into her own slice of pie. 

The next few weeks pass quickly. Full of work, classes, and class work. He sees his friends, Betty included, regularly but quickly. They never seem to have more than an hour to squeeze in coffee or lunch. 

Then finals week rolls around and he’s completely slammed and so is she. He doesn’t even run into her in the gym. If she’s running at all it’s on the road. They exchange a few short texts, but that doesn’t feel like enough. Still he’s too busy to give it much thought. 

Then on the last day of class after meeting with his thesis advisor, Betty is waiting outside the classroom a huge smile on her face. Before he can even get a word out she screams “The New Yorker accepted my piece Jug! They are publishing it in three weeks.”

He hugs her tightly, that he can’t help but feel both the muscles and the curves of her body. He feels a current run through him. Something he’s never felt before, or maybe something he has felt before with her, but tried to ignore. This need to be with her. 

Not just physically, although his body knows that would be nice. His chest is pounding that that would be nice, and he’s had to readjust the hug just so it’s clear how happy another part of his body is. 

But most of all he has this desire to share his life with her. To have the easy banter, and funny conversations, they get to share a couple times a week, every single day. To cook with her, to clean with her, to write with her. 

All technically things they could do as friends. But not as often as he would like. Not in the way he would like.

Because he’s not just excited because she got into the New Yorker, or that this hug is one of the best ever, but that he gets to see her at all for the first time in a week. He missed her, he realizes, in a way he never wants to miss her again. 

Even though they spend the rest of the afternoon and evening together. Hours spent drinking, and talking, and watching movies, he never tells her how much he misses her. How much he must want more.

She leaves the next day, early in the morning. She tells him via text when she takes off. She, Fred, and Archie are spending Christmas in Florida with Fred’s Grandparents. When she lands she sends him a picture of palm trees. 

A day later he’s in San Francisco with Toni when Toni turns to him and says “You’ve got to tell Betty.”

“Tell Betty what?” Jughead says. They’d been sitting on the sofa, eating doritos and watching a documentary about Donkey Kong. He has no context for the question about Betty. 

“You have to tell Betty that you have feelings for her.”

“I don’t.” Jughead says automatically, reaching for a chip. 

Toni pauses the movie. “Jughead, I don’t think you actually believe that.”

He can’t help but grin. He’s grateful for Toni’s ability to always call him on his shit. “You’re right. I don’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a really long chapter! I just had so much to say, that had to be said. I actually have a feeling that all the remaining chapters will be really long! Hopefully the length was a bonus! 
> 
> It was tough but rewarding to write.
> 
> I would be particularly grateful for feedback!
> 
> Oh and thanks for holding on, we are at the end of the slow burn - or very close to it.


	6. Second Year, Second Quarter

Betty is reading at home. There is a chicken pot pie in the oven. She hasn’t seen Jughead since before Christmas. They exchanged long emails over the break, and they’ve been back a week, but he was working the evening shift at the gym, and she was busy with PI work. 

He’s coming over tonight, for a proper catch up. His wording not hers. She could hear his nerves over the phone. She wonders what that could possibly about. They’ve been so comfortable with each other for so long. 

There is a knock on the door and Betty goes over to answer it. Jughead is there. He’s wearing a blue pea coat, a tentative grin, and he’s carrying a bunch of flowers. 

“What is with these?” Betty asks, gesturing at the flowers. Normally she’d greet him warmly, hug him, but she’s thrown off balance by the flowers. He’s never really brought her anything before. Flowers send a very different signal than she is used to.

“Toni insisted I buy you some. She said it would force me to be honest with you.”

“Honest?” Betty says, confused by the situation. Jughead is pulling off layers as she watches, a little stunned, a little off balanced. 

Jughead having finally taken off his shoes, walks over to her, so he’s standing less than a foot from her. “I have feelings for you. Romantic feelings. I kept trying to bury them, but it didn’t work. Apparently I spent all Christmas pining for you - according to Toni. I don’t really like the word pine. It doesn’t seem exactly accurate.”

“Oh.” Betty says. She feels shocked. She’d never thought he thought of her that way.

“I’m sorry.” Jughead says “Look, we can still be friends. I just had to tell you this. I had to be honest with you.”

Betty can tell by the expression on his face, and the way his feet are shuffling, how nervous Jughead is. How much this seems to be taking out of him. 

She wishes she could take him out of his misery, help him in some way, but instead she just feels shocked. 

“Say something.” He finally says, looking soft and impossibly young. 

She wants to say something but the simple fact is this, she hasn’t thought of him like that before. She admired his bone structure, may have even considered what it would be like to kiss him, to sleep with him before, but it never went beyond that. A very theoretical speculation, a passing thought. Nothing more. 

Betty loves Jughead as a friend, she’s known that for a while. But the idea of loving him as something more is scary. 

The problem with falling in love with a close friend, the problem she’d learned about when she broke up with Val is that she lost the friendship they shared, as well as the romance. It was the proverbial baby lost in the bath water. It made everything so much worse.

Betty wants to be strong enough to be willing to lose Jughead. To risk their friendship on something that could be even better, but she’s not sure it is worth it. She’s never had a friendship with anyone that is as rich, as varied, as deep as the one she has with him. It approaches what she has with Archie, but without the element of brother that so deeply defines who Archie is to her.

But that friendship she cherishes with him might already be gone, and it is in the very least changed, by what Jughead just said, by what he’s been feeling. 

His face looks even more forlorn now, so she forces herself to speak “Jughead, I can’t give you an answer now. But you are so important to me. I’m not saying no, I’m just saying let me think about it.”

A look of relief floods his face. “Really?”

“Really.” She says. “Anyways, dinners ready. I’m just keeping it warm in the oven. It’s chicken pot pie.”

“Good.” Jughead says, as he follows her into the kitchen. She tries to look at him like she did before. As her best friend, but she can’t help but view him a little differently now, as a potential romantic interest.

They eat together at the table, he tells her about Christmas in California, and how Toni ordered an impossible amount of Vietnamese food and they somehow ate it all in one sitting. Betty tells him how she and Archie played golf with his 90 year old grandfather, and his grandfather trounced them both. How Teresa was there, and how well she got along with everybody else.

After they finish the pie, they move over to the sofa. Betty sits on one end and Jughead on the other, and it feels weirdly formal. It had never been like that between them before. 

“I promised myself I wouldn’t date during graduate school,” Betty says, breaking the silence between them. 

“Oh.” Jughead says.

“I had lots of reasons. Small community, lots of infighting, weird bed mates. Besides I really wanted to focus on my degree.”

“I can see that.” Jughead says. “Although clearly I had the opposite approach.”

That brings up the issue that makes Betty nervous, so nervous she wouldn’t even allow herself to think of it initially, Jughead’s history of sleeping around. She doesn’t want to judge it, she knows that isn’t right, but it still makes her worry. What if one person isn’t enough for him? What if she isn’t enough for him?

“I know.” Betty says.

“I figured everyone does. It’s the sort of thing that gets around.” Jughead says with a shrug. “But I want you to know that I haven't slept with anyone in a long time.”

“What’s a long time?” Betty asks, raising one eyebrow.

Jughead is silent for a second and seems to be doing some sort of mental math. “Three months.”

“I’m almost at two years now.”

“Sounds like me in undergrad.”

“What?” Betty’s shocked. She tries not think about it much, since Archie is her brother after all, but he once complained to her about going a month without sex, which resulted in her plugging her ears with both her hands and shaking her head. She had just assumed that Jughead was that way too. 

“The first two years of undergrad, I just wanted to focus on getting by. I was older than most of the other students. I just kept my head down and focused. Besides sex isn’t something I always want. When I’m confident, like I was when I first came here, sex is great. But when i’m nervous, when I’m busy figuring things out, I just don’t have the energy for casual relationships.”

“Oh.” Betty’s never been one for casual relationships, period. She’s always been committed or single, both equally serious endeavours for her. 

“So you became less confident this summer?” Betty asks. She wants to know the reason for the last five months, for the pattern shift. 

“Last spring someone I was sleeping with accused me of having feelings for you. I laughed them off, but when I told Toni, she thought I had feelings for you as well. I thought about it a lot, and Toni’s rarely wrong.” Jughead shrugs.

Betty shakes her head. “Why didn’t you say anything then?”

“Toni thought you didn’t reciprocate my feelings and even now you seem less than sure.” Betty answers him with a tentative nod. “And I thought I could get over you. I thought I was over you actually. Till I had sex with someone in early fall, and it, well it wasn’t good.”

“Ok.” Betty says not sure what she should do with all this information. 

“So I thought it would be easier if I waited longer. But my feelings for you didn’t go away. Finally, Toni forced my hand. She said she was going to call you and tell you if I didn’t man up.”

“How mean of her.” Betty says, but she can’t help but giggle.

“I need to be pushed sometimes. Look, even if you say no and we remain friends, I will be glad that I told you, because as terrible as I felt when I first told you, I feel way better now.”

Betty smiles. “Thank you for trusting me with this. All of it.”

“I know you’re trustworthy.” Jughead says, and that line keeps running through Betty’s head over the next few days. She thinks about it while she runs, while she writes, while she sits in class and listens to her workshop leader Prof. Fox rant about the importance of perspective. 

She thinks about everything Jughead said that night, but she keeps coming back to her own feelings. How unsure she is about them. 

Some of this has to do with her past. Her two previous relationships were built on friendships, because she is incapable of trusting strangers. 

She knows she trusts Jughead, but is unsure of if she is romantically attracted to him. But the same was true of her previous relationships. Both times she only realized she had feelings when they kissed her. Both times it felt like a revelation. Doors being flung open. She was so used to denying her feelings, to relegating them to a small part of her mind and heart, that she could be slow on the uptake. 

Still none of that changed the fact that she is still in grad school. That she swore she wasn’t going to date here. Now she is considering it. 

When she see Jughead at the first big literary journal meeting post Christmas break, she can’t help but think that he’s objectively handsome. Sometimes when he hugs her she feels this desire to never let go, but that was just comfort right? 

All of the literary journal editors have made progress. The solicited works have now been received and one of them is surprisingly good. honest in a way that shocks Betty. Most of the editors reading groups are only halfway through making final decisions. So they don’t know exactly how long the literary journal will be at this point. 

Kevin is dissatisfied by the quality of the poetry submitted. But they have to publish at least five unsolicited poems to balance the issue. He looks pissed about that, but agrees reluctantly. 

After the meeting Jughead and Betty usually go for coffee, and this time is no different. They don’t discuss his feelings though or hers. Instead they just talk about their new workshops. 

Betty is so grateful to never have to see Prof. Green again in a formal setting. She actually ran into her on campus the day after the New Yorker ran Betty’s piece. Prof. Green complimented Betty on it, even though the piece was far from flattering in terms of the professor. Still there was tension between then, and Betty did what she could to avoid running into her on campus.

Betty’s new professor, Prof. Fox is a nice guy, although he always looks a little sleepy, and Betty has caught him napping in his office both times she visited. Jughead has Prof. McTavish this quarter. Jughead swears he’s drunk half the time. 

They hug goodbye and Betty wonders how long Jughead will continue to be patient with her. She wonders how long she will feel like she is in limbo. 

When Betty gets home that night she calls Archie on facetime. She’s been putting it off for days. She wants to talk to him about Jughead. She needs his opinion on this, but it is awkward because Jughead’s his friend too. She has to take that into consideration. 

Archie picks up and Betty can see that he’s at home, in his apartment in LA. His hair is a mess, and his guitar is in his hands. “What’s up?” he asks, as he settles back down into his favorite chair.

Betty rips the band-aid off. “Jughead told me that he likes me. That he’d like to date me. He said he would stay friends if I wasn’t interested, but he couldn’t not ask me out.”

Archie’s facial expressions run the gamut from a smile to a frown in about a minute. “Do you like him?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t really think of him that way. I’m trying to focus on school.”

Archie grins. “If you told him no right now, would you be able to focus on school again completely?”

It’s a good question and it catches her off guard. She was expecting him to ask specifically Jughead related questions. Not something like this. 

“No, I mean I would still be thinking about what could have been. Because I do really like him as a friend, and that’s rare for me.”

“If the rule isn’t working, throw it out.” Archie says.

“So you think it’s that simple? I’m still not sure if I actually like him.”

Archie laughs. “Betty, if you didn’t like him you would have already said no. How many people have you turned down since you started grad school?”. Dozens of names and faces flash through Betty’s brain. 

“Shit, you’re right!” She says, hitting her knee. “How did you know that?”

“Because I know you.” Archie says with a wry grin. “Although I can’t get over the idea that you’re actually going to date a guy. I thought living with two of them had broken you of that forever.”

It is Betty’s turn to laugh.”We will see.” she says. Because after all she’s still not a hundred percent sure she can say yes to trying something with someone who is so important to her, someone she might lose if it goes south. Things for her have always gone south. 

“Betty, I really like Jughead.” Archie says, and Betty can hear the sincerity in his voice. 

“You can date him.” Betty quips.

Archie shakes his head “You know I don’t mean it that way. I mean he’s a good guy. He’d be a good fit for you. He is as a friend already.”

“I know. It doesn’t help that in the past he’s been a bit…” Betty pauses, she doesn’t actually want to say a bit “like you” outloud.

“of a fuckboi?” Archie says one eyebrow raised. Betty winces at the word choice but nods. “He wasn’t like that at all this summer.” Archie says. “I saw him turn women down, not pick them up.”

That confirms what Jughead had said, and Betty feels a little better about that angle as well.

“You know for the right person, I would settle down?” Archie says. “Maybe Jughead’s found that in you.”

“Maybe.” Betty says “I’ll believe it when you date less than three women in one month.”

Archie looks insulted for a second, and then thoughtful. “Fair enough.” 

Betty falls asleep easier that night. It feels like an answer, or at least close to an answer. But she doesn’t rush things. At least not too much. The first thing she does the following morning is text Jughead and ask him to go out the movies.

It’s black and white night at the local cinema, and after sitting through North by Northwest in companionable silence they go for a walk. It’s an unseasonably warm night for early February.

“I’m still thinking about it.” Betty says. “I just really came into grad school thinking I wasn’t going to date anyone and i’m finding it hard to break that promise, even with myself.”

Jughead is quiet beside her. She looks down, and she notices that they’re accidentally walking in sync. First their left feet go forward and then their right, as if they planned it. Even though things are strained between them right now, they are still so compatible.

“I’m willing to wait, till after.” Jughead says, “If you want to give this a shot, I can wait.”

Betty stops, she didn’t expect that. She didn’t even think of that as an option. She turns and meets his gaze, stopping under the light of a streetlamp. “You can still date other people. Till graduation if you want. You can change your mind even.”

Jughead laughs, a low chuckle, and shakes his head. “I’m not going to change my mind.” 

“But you can.”

“You can too.” Jughead says. It’s Betty’s turn to laugh. 

* * *

Jughead is at the front desk of the gym, working on an outline of what he think might become his second novel, when he gets a call from his agent, Benjamin Lowe. He picks up, not expecting anything really. Book deals take time, his agent assures him, and while they’ve gotten a few bites, nothing has really been real. 

“Jughead, are you sitting down?”

“When am I not?” 

“Harper Collins just sent me the contract. They want to sign you for a two book deal. I didn’t want to tell you till I got it in writing.”

Jughead feels adrenaline, or joy, flush through his veins. As quietly as possible he says “Holy shit.”

“I think the contract looks good, and the advance is substantial, fifty thousand dollars, so I don’t know why you wouldn’t sign. But you should come in and look it over with me, and figure out the details as soon as possible.”

“Of course. Does two work?”

“Yes. That would be great.” 

“Can I bring a friend?” 

Benjamin chuckles. “Sure.”

Half an hour later Betty and he are on the train to the city, and then a half hour after that they are in Benjamin’s well appointed office drinking coffee in blue mugs that have the words printers ink written on them. 

Benjamin seems curious about Betty, then impressed when he realizes she just published in The New Yorker. He hadn’t read her article yet but he had heard about it.

“How come I haven't read your manuscript?” He asks. 

“Because it is easier to publish a collection of non-fiction essays if they’ve already been published elsewhere. Only two of mine have been so far.” Betty says with a shrug.

“Please send it my way anyways. I try not to represent couples but I can make an exception.”

“We’re not a couple.” Betty says, and the words cut Jughead a little, even though he knows it’s true. Sometimes he feels like Betty’s request that they wait to graduation is just a stalling tactic to give her more time to actually think about it. A way to preserve their friendship for the time being. 

Still sometimes he swears he catches her looking at him as if she wants more. Last time she hugged him, he was sure he wasn’t the only reason it was a lingering one. 

It’s been a month now. This quarter was more than half over and there was only one quarter to go after that. They were firmly in the home stretch now. Jughead kept reminding himself of that. Come June he would know the truth, either way.

“She’s my editor.” Jughead says, “and my friend, obviously.”

Benjamin nods, and then they review the contract together, which is a much more laborious and time consuming process than Jughead imagined. In his fantasies their is always just one thing to sign, and it goes quickly. 

Betty doesn’t really weigh in on the contract, but she takes a picture of Jughead signing it, and sends it to Archie and Toni, then forwards a copy to Jughead himself. 

“I’m going to have to put this on social media, aren't I?” Jughead says with a groan. 

“Yes.” Benjamin says. “Having social media and using it often is part of the contract for a reason.”

“This goes against my every instinct.” Jughead says. He had an Instagram account that he used sporadically, but he’d never used anything else. That was all about to change.

“There are professionals that do this for a living.” Benjamin says. “I can give you a list of names if you want.”

“Not yet.” Jughead says with a sigh, but by the time he leaves the office he feels elated again. They go to Koreatown and eat BiBimBap, before heading back. The hug he gives before saying goodbye to Betty is long, but he keeps wanting more. 

This limbo is getting to him. If they were actually dating they would have gone somewhere fancy for dinner. The whole thing would have felt more celebratory. Instead Jughead feels like he has half of what he wants. 

Two days later he feels like it really is a compromise when he’s working at the gym, and he sees Lucas approach Betty. He likes Lucas, ever since the other man had stood up for Betty in class, and at first when they talk, he’s happy to see it. 

But as they keep talking, both on rowing machines now, he starts to feel a little more leery. When they get off the machines and wipe them down, Jughead gets up and wanders over, under the guise of checking the garbage. But if he’s being honest with himself he’s really just snooping. 

Betty doesn’t notice Jughead, she’s so caught up in the conversation with Lucas. Jughead can’t follow anything really at first, till he hears Lucas say “Would you go out on a date with me?”

Jughead feels a spike of energy through his body. Of anger maybe, or panic. 

“I don’t date.” Betty says, and Jughead feels immediate relief. Betty had given Jughead a deadline. She was not offering Lucas the same thing. 

“So let’s just hang out.” Lucas says with a shrug.

“Sure.” Betty says and they exchange phone numbers. Jughead has run out of excuses to linger anyways, so he walks off back to the desk. 

Betty doesn’t say anything to him about it, but why should she. She isn’t dating him, and she isn’t dating Lucas. 

The next time they see each other outside the gym, it’s for the final literary journal meeting before they send the issue into press. It’s celebratory and everyone is in a good mood. Although Betty is gearing up for the actual launch. 

They hold steady to their movie night, and drinks after, and everything feels close to normal. It Jughead’s not opening up quite as much as he used to, well it can’t be helped. Whenever he tries explaining the situation to Toni to get her guidance, she just reiterates that he has to be patient. She reminds him that Betty said he’s free to date. 

Toni thinks it’s a good idea. After all dating, with the idea of possibly being in a long term relationship with someone is something he’s never really tried.

Jughead signs up for a dating site, briefly, but just skimming through photos of other people make him feel a little ill. He deletes the account unused. He refuses to try with anyone at school, it would just be too messy.

Then before the last week of classes he sees Lucas and Betty in a cafe near campus. He’s waiting for coffee at the bar when they spot him and wave him over to where they are sitting by the window.

“Come join us.” Lucas says warmly.

“I don’t want to intrude.” Jughead says, his to-go cup now firmly in his hands.

“You won’t be.” Betty assures. “Lucas was just asking me about your contract with Harper Collins.”

Jughead shouldn’t be entirely shocked. The whole of campus has been talking about. Even some undergrads had approached him about it. All seeking advice. Out of all the graduate students, his careers and Betty’s appeared to be the most secure.

“Oh.” Jughead says and before he knows it they’ve somehow spent half an hour discussing the strange world of publishing, including Lucas’s run in with vanity publishing when he was a teen. 

Even if he felt jealous of Lucas, he likes the guy. He’s easy going and smart with a quips at the ready. 

The next time he and Betty are out after the movies (Rear Window this time), Jughead brings up how nice Lucas is.

Betty nods and says “Apparently I can be friends with men now.” as if it is some sort of novelty. As if he is just a friend. 

He can’t stop himself from turning towards her and asking “Is that all I am to you? A friend. Are Lucas and I in the same category?” 

A shocked look crosses Betty’s face and he knows she’s about to say something, but he can’t stay to hash this out. He’s giving a reading tomorrow in the city, they both do, and he can’t get too tired or upset before it. Instead he just grabs his jacket, not even bothering to pull it on, and walks out into the cold spring evening. 

All night he tosses and turns in his sleep. But he manages to get enough. He practices his reading in the afternoon, and then takes the train into the city with Matt. 

“Are you nervous?” Matt asks.

“Of course.” Jughead replies, and he hopes that Matt thinks he’s only nervous about the reading. 

The venue is a famous bookstore, and it’s already crowded when he gets there. Betty has saved a seat for him, and they talk as if nothing happened last night. They have to focus on getting through the actual reading after all. 

This reading is billed as a face off. There are six readers total. Jughead, Betty, and Kevin represent their graduate program, and three other students represent the other famous MFA program in the area. 

Kevin goes first. He reads three poems about being queer in small town America, and Jughead for the first time feels something real for the man. On campus most of the tme Kevin seems like the impervious king of gossip, and not a human being. But those poems could only be written by one. 

The poet from the other school, an elegant women named Maria, goes next. Her poems are beautiful in terms of language, but they feel empty. Jughead’s mind drifts to Betty on the seat next to him. To Lucas somewhere in the audience behind them. But before he can get too deep in thought, it’s his name they are calling. 

He goes up to the podium and reads the first chapter of his book. It’s the first time he’s read it outloud to anyone off campus, and he’s surprised by how confident he feels by the end. He walks back to his seat feeling a little high off the applause. “You did great.” Betty whispers in his ear.

TIm is the fiction representative of the other school. He’s tall and funny, but his story goes nowhere, and Jughead can’t help but note that the applause is less than enthusiastic. 

Then it’s Betty’s turn to go up. He can tell how nervous she is as she walks up the aisle, but once she reaches the podium she takes a deep breath and she suddenly looks confident. 

She reads an excerpt from her New Yorker piece. One Jughead has read multiple times, yet hearing her read it for the first time is transformative. He feels each word in his whole body. Behind him a stranger whispers “this is what real writing sounds like” and he files the sentence away to repeat it to her later. 

Betty’s beaming when she sits back down beside him. Katherine, the non-fiction representative of their rival school goes last. At this point he’s not even really paying attention, but everyone else appears to be, and the applause is pretty loud. 

As soon as the readings over he’s surrounded by people with questions and praise. Forty-five minutes has passed by the time he’s actually able to look around the now mostly empty room. Betty is gone. 

On the way home he checks his phone and sees a single text that says “Come to my apartment.”

* * *

 

The first thing she does when he arrives, and has taken off his coat and his shoes, is kiss him. She catches him by surprise, she knows, because his lips don’t quite meet hers, they’re a little too open and when she pulls away he’s clearly shocked, but his eyes seem exceptionally shiny.

“Let’s try that again.” He says leaning down this time and when she presses her lips into his, his press back. 

It’s gentle at first, and they bump noses a little awkwardly but then she gets caught up in the give and take of it, the way his lips press in and then away, and his tongue is sneaking its way into her mouth and she feels its sweep.

She pulls away, she feels good to the point of almost being light headed, so caught up in this kiss. It has been too long. She feels like a high schooler again. Filled with desire, but not the confidence to back it up. Maybe she stopped for too long. Maybe she’s an amature at this again.

But when she looks up into Jughead’s eyes, it’s clear that his head is in some other blissful place. His cheeks are flushed and his philtrum is red. 

“So you like me?”

Betty nods her answer. She can’t trust her ability to form words right now.

“Will you be my girlfriend?”

“Isn’t it a little soon.”

“I want to make one thing very clear.” Jughead says, his blue eyes gleaming. “I am serious about you.”

Betty thinks about how much chaos all this could invite into her life, and then she thinks of the kiss again. Of the fact that he’s clearly going out of his way to make sure she’s not like the other girls he’s slept with. 

“Ok.” She says, feeling a little self conscious about how much she wants to kiss again. “Just can we keep this quiet. At least for a little bit, while we figure this out.”

Jughead places the palm of his hand against the side of her face and then just keeps it there. 

“Of course. But I should warn you, half of campus thinks we’re hooking up already.”  
Jughead says and Betty feels her face flush uncomfortably red.

She notices something serious in his eyes, right next to the happiness. She’s about to ask what that is about when he says, “What changed your mind? Why did you decide not to wait till graduation.”

Betty’s not sure how to explain it. Her opinion started to shift a month ago, when she began hanging out with Lucas, when they became friends. She realized as they got closer that her feelings for Lucas were so different and so much less substantial than her feelings for Jughead. There was nothing deep there. 

It made her miss him, more and more each week. And then last night, their conversation had brought all those thoughts and feelings to a head. She missed having a closer relationship with him and she didn’t have to. She was so worried about losing him as friend if they dated, that she was self sabotaging.

“I realized what I have with all my other friends, including Mia, Kay, and Lucas, is nothing compared to what I have with you, what I feel for you. After I figured it out, waiting just seemed stupid.”

The grin on Jughead’s face was impossibly big. 

Betty continues though. She has one more thing to say. “I mean I was so worried that I’d make a mistake here, that I was hurting myself and you. I would rather make a grand mistake with you in my life, than go it alone”

She takes a breath and she’s about to say more, but then his lips capture hers, and there is no going back to talking for a half hour.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super nervous about this chapter. It went through so many revisions it was a little absurd. 
> 
> Hopefully I made some of the right choices. I would really appreciate feedback (I always do, but particularly now).


	7. Second Year, Third Quarter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the wonderful feedback last chapter!
> 
> I kept debating if I should include this note or not, but if you are reading it, clearly I did. 
> 
> I don’t write smut, but there is a lot of frank sexual discussions in this chapter. I feel like based on who Jughead and Betty are in this story it would be disingenuous not to include that. There is also stuff around sex, and some of it is rather intimate. 
> 
> If all of this screams not you - please skip the first section.
> 
> It turns out that chapters like this are extremely hard to write. Particularly if you write most of your work in Starbucks.
> 
> Honestly, I think this chapter is why I was so hesitant to write this story in the first place. This part of a relationship is really hard to write about because it’s often so raw - but because the heart of this story is honesty and reality, i’m going there.

Betty almost falls asleep in class. In undergrad that would have been acceptable, the classes were large, and someone falling asleep in a classroom of two hundred students, was almost a given. As long as one didn’t snore or fall out of their seat, no one cared. In a class that only contained nineteen other students and one teacher, her falling asleep would have been far from discrete. 

Thankfully she keeps herself awake by slowly drinking the coffee her large travel mug contains. The instructor’s tone is meloditic, and while the contents of what Prof. Johnson is saying is interesting, the way he is saying it is not. 

Betty notices at least one other sleep fighter in the class. A first year who keeps rubbing his eyes. 

It’s not just Prof. Johnson that is putting her to sleep though. Another factor is how tired she is. The week off between quarters was not really a break this time. Her PI firm offered her time and a half to spend the week in Costa Rica, with another PI, tailing a suspected cheating husband. 

They had indeed caught the husband in the act, but on the very last day, which had made it impossible for Betty to switch to an earlier flight home, as she had planned. She had flown in on a red eye this morning.

The New Yorker had paid well, and Betty’s bank account was actually accumulating more savings than anticipated, so she hadn’t technically needed to go. But she found it so hard to turn down work. She liked the comfort that savings brought. 

Besides she was starting to prepare for life after graduation. She had started to line up a few interviews for editor positions that were prestigious, but all of them paid too little. Her bosses at the PI firm had made it abundantly clear that if she wanted to work full time for them they could offer her a better position, one that made her a partner in the company. 

Betty would love to dismiss the position as PI out of hand, but she liked PI work, and more than that the income she would earn would remove stress from her life. 

Most of the time Professors let students go early on the first day, not Prof. Johnson, he lectured till five minutes past the hour. 

The minute she stepped outside the building, the cold air made her feel fully awake. It was a surprisingly wonderful feeling. Betty was halfway across the lawn when she heard Jughead yell her name. She turned towards his voice and saw him step out of the cafeteria and walk over to her. 

The hug they exchanged felt anything but platonic, but no one observing from a distance would notice any difference between this hug, and the one they had exchanged at the start of the school year. 

“You’re back!” He says, enthusiastically, pulling away. She gets a better look at his face. While she managed to get a tan on her week off, his skin tone was paler. He had gone back to Chicago, where he had grown up, for the week. As part of the publication process, he had to run what he’d written in the book past the people he’d written it about.

Toni had seen many drafts of the manuscripts, but most members of his old gang had seen nothing, and Jughead had not seen them in years. The person Betty knew he had been the most nervous about seeing it was his dad. 

He had visited FP in prison on his first day back and over the phone he had told Betty it had gone as well as could be expected. Betty and Jughead had not been able to talk much over break, between their busy schedules and time zone difference. 

“Hi” Betty says, feeling almost shy. They had an established friendship, but they were still feeling the romantic relationship out. The week they spent apart had made her miss him more than she thought she would. 

She had missed the physicality of him. The tenderness and the toughness of him. “Do you want to come over?”

She’s exhausted and still not unpacked. But she can’t stress too much about it. She wants to order cheap Chinese food and stay in with him. 

“Yes.” He says it with words, but the smile on his face makes it even more clear.

“Did you bring the bike?” Betty asks.

He shakes his head. It’s technically spring now, but the weather has yet to improve much. There is lots of slush on the ground. 

Her place is only a twelve minute walk and if they walked quickly it would only take ten minutes. She doesn’t want to rush it too much though. She wants to be alone with him. But there’s a different kind of physical tension when they’re alone. 

“So how’d it go? Did everyone sign off on the book?”

“Yes.” Jughead shrugs. “I think the Serpents have mostly folded. The numbers are nothing compared to what they used to be in terms of active members. They seem to be out of the gun running business too“

“And your dad was good?”

“Yeah.” Jughead shrugs. “I mean he says I made him out to be shittier than he was in the book.“

“Oh.” Betty says. 

“He wasn’t happy for me to visit him. He’s getting out in three months and he told me that he wasn’t planning on seeing me after that.”

“Shit.”

“Indeed. But when I asked him what had upset him so much about the book, he couldn’t give a single example.” Betty could hear the frustration in Jughead’s voice. She notices the way his hands tug at the sleeves of his coat. 

“I’m sorry.” Betty says, and then she shifts the subject. “How were Sweet Pea and Fangs?”

“Good. They’re both no longer actively involved in the Serpents. They run a bar together. Not the dodgy kind with gang affiliations, but a cocktail bar known as a gathering place for after work drinks. It was easy to be around them.”

“That’s good.” They are more than halfway to her place now. 

“That tan looks good on you.” Jughead says. Betty blushes. They aren't holding hands. They haven't been in public. She wants this to be just for the two of them for a while longer. They have been together less than a month after all. 

But they had told Kay, Mia, and Matt of course, and none of them had seemed to care really. Although Mia did say “I called it” with a wink.

Betty had also told Lucas, which was harder. He was nice about it, but there was a bit of an edge to his voice when he said “Did you tell him you didn’t date either?” and Betty had to explain everything in excruciating detail. But she knew she had to tell him before he found out on his own. She had done the right thing, even if it was painful. They were still friends. In fact they had coffee plans tomorrow. 

Jughead was silent by the time they reached Betty’s apartment. She could feel the energy hum between them.

They haven't had sex yet. Betty hasn’t felt comfortable enough, It’s never been something she’s rushed into. But she can feel now that her body wants her to hurry up, and her mind is refusing. 

Jughead’s been patient with her so far, but they’ve also not had a lot of time. They got together in the busy last weeks of the quarter and then were apart for a week over break. 

When the door to the apartment closes behind them Jughead slams his mouth into hers so hard their teeth clink. There is no time for wincing though, the kiss is impossibly full and good. He traps her tongue between his teeth at one point, and Betty can taste him so fully, she wants more of everything. 

Jughead pulls back, his breathing heavy. Only then does she realize that he has her pressed against the kitchen island. To her surprise, he lifts her up onto the counter and then in a soft voice, asks “can you?” and she knows he’s asking her to take her shirt off. 

She pulls off the simple long sleeve t-shirt, and then unhooks the plain black bra she’s wearing. He steps back for a second, exhales loudly, and she knows without words that he likes what he sees. 

“Equal rights.” Betty says, raising an eyebrow, and he takes off his shirt with a grin. She’s seen his upper body before, but never in such good light. He has tattoos on both his arms but none on his chest or stomach. There is a scar on his left side, right near the rib cage. 

He pulls her off the counter and they make their way to the sofa together, a little stumbly. 

Betty’s grateful she doesn’t have a roomate. She sits down and then he sits next to her and turns, pressing his body against hers, so she can feel him, and she almost jumps with shock. 

It’s not like an erection is a mystery to her. It’s just not something she’s had to deal with before that much. Now that she and Jughead been fooling around, she’s gotten more used to it, but it is still an adjustment. 

She wasn’t used to feeling arousal like this. The feedback can be helpful though. She notices how he moves every time she presses her mouth into him.

“Can we?” He asks, his hand is pressed against the top of her jeans. 

Betty’s whole body is saying yes, but she forces her mouth to say no, and she pulls back. She knows she’s going too slow for him, that if it was up to him they would have been together physically a long time ago. 

But Betty’s not been one to rush things. Not in her first relationship, not in her second, and certainly not in this one. The one time she tried to be more casual about such things, she had to deal with serious consequences. She’s not one to let her body, how good this feels, rule her life. 

Her therapist says it’s a matter of control, of safety. She needs to feel both these things, in order to really enjoy sex, in order for there not to be severe emotional repercussions. She’s told Jughead that. They’ve talked about it before abstractly. But she knows that in this moment, their bodies still pressed together, their breath still rapid, it’s hard to think about that. 

Jughead pulls away from her, and leans against the other arm of the sofa. His hair is all messed up, sticking every different direction. The expression on his face can only be described as disappointment. Then he shakes his head, and his expression reforms into something more neutral.

“Sorry. I’m trying to be patient.”

Betty nods. “I get it. It’s not as easy for me as I make it seem. I want to talk first though - we need to.”

A look that can only be described as hope covers his face. 

“I got tested. I’m clean. If that is what you’re worried about.” Jughead said. “It was one of the many awkward things I took care of in Chicago.”

“Good. That was definitely on my mind. But it’s not the only thing.”

Jughead nods and Betty takes a deep breath. But before she says anything, she moves over towards him, so that her head is now on his chest and her still jean clad legs are next to his. 

“This is not helping me concentrate” Jughead says, once she settles.

She laughs lightly into his chest. “I can get dressed.” She starts to get up but he uses his arm to pull her back and once she’s snuggled up against him again he keeps it there. 

“I’ve only been with three people.” Betty says. “It’s just how my mind works. I want this, so badly but I can’t get there as quickly as you. I need to feel safe, in control, like we talked about before.”

“I have no problem giving you control.” Jughead says, and even though Betty can’t see his grin, she can hear it in his voice. 

“I can’t feel in control if I don’t feel safe. I’m getting closer to feeling safe, but I’m not there yet.”

“Ok.” Jughead says. “Is it because you don’t trust me?”

“No. It’s because I don’t know you.” 

Jughead laughs. “What do you mean? You know me. Not only did you edit my life story but we’ve spent large chunks of the last two years together. We tell eachother everything.”

Betty would raise an eyebrow at that, but there’s no point, he can’t see her face. “Not everything. Until just now you didn’t know I’ve only had three partners. For example.”

“True. All women?” Jughead asks. “I mean I know you said you’d never been in a relationship with a man, but that doesn’t exactly rule out you having sex with one.”

“I’ve had sex with Caroline and Valerie.” Betty says. “My high school girlfriend and my college girlfriend, and between them I tried to be with someone casually, Jessica was her name, but it didn’t work for me. It would be fine in the moment, but not after.”

“I’m sorry, but i’m glad you told me that.” Jughead says. “Betty, I…’ Jughead pauses and Betty can feel his heart pounding beneath her.

“You’ve been with more women than you can list.” Betty volunteers after the silence grows awkward.

“Not technically. I think I remember everyone’s name, but it would take a while. I don’t think it would be pleasant for either of us. I’ve only had the one serious relationship with Tiffany though. So I feel like my heart is rather unscathed.” Betty couldn’t help but laugh at his word choice. Then Jughead continued “But some of the women, you know, and so I should probably tell you their names.”

Betty’s knows there were a lot of women here, that he was with during first year, but when he starts listing their names, she feels a little queasy. She pulls away and sits up. She finds a throw blanket to cover the top part of her body. 

Then at the very end of the list, quietly, he says “Mia.”

“I did know that one.” Betty says. 

“I figured.” Jughead says. “But Lara was the only person I was consistent with.”

‘It just feels awkward. Knowing that all these other women know what you’re like in bed.”

Jughead goes bright red. “I never thought of it like that.”

Betty can sense he is uncomfortable. “It’s just something I’m getting used to.”

“What, me being more experienced?”

Betty laughs, because she hadn’t thought of it that way at all. “Not exactly. I mean you may have had sex with more people but i’ve definitely had more sex.”

Jughead sits up “How the hell do you figure that?”

“There’s been a bunch of studies about it. Long term monogamous couples have sex about once to twice a week. Serial daters, have a hard time competing with that kind of regularity. I’ve been in two long term relationships for a total of almost nine years.”

Jughead laughs, “I can’t believe you brought up study data during this deeply personal discussion.” Betty can feel a blush cover her cheeks. But Jughead continues “But you have a point in more than one way. You have experience in being in a serious relationship, while I do not. At least not as an adult.”

Betty puts an arm around Jughead, and kisses his forehead. “We are both adjusting. We just need to be patient with each other.” 

Jughead bends down and kisses along her neck “I can be patient. I was prepared to wait till graduation to even date you.” 

The way Betty’s body is responding to these kisses is not patient at all. Instead she moves his face to meet hers, and their lips press into each other. All thoughts not directly relating to this moment, this feeling, fly out of her mind. The throw blanket slips off her.

Although somehow she manages to say, when she takes a break for air “We need to communicate too.”

Jughead laughs, flips her over onto her back and blows a raspberry directly above her belly button. As she dissolves into laughter she can barely hear him say “This is communicating right?”.

Things continue to progress between them. They go on a museum date, and they go out to the movies every week, although Betty hardly counts that as a date, given it is something they always did. 

But now sometimes after the movie he spends the night. Her apartment is closer to campus and roomate free, so they spend a fair amount of time there. They still haven't had sex yet, and Betty knows that it’s something Jughead wants, and increasingly her body does to. 

Her body is ready too. She’s been on birth control for years, for hormonal issues, so she knows she’s prepared in that respect at least, not that she’s ready to forgo condoms, but she wants to be as safe as possible.

But Betty’s mind is still not ready yet. Or rather some days she is, and then she runs into someone Jughead slept with before on campus, and then she changes her mind. Or she overhears another guy on campus talk about girls as if they are not even human really. She knows that guy is not Jughead, that they have nothing in common, but it still puts her on edge, makes her snappy. 

Still Betty knows they can’t wait forever, she doesn’t want to and it’s frustrating for both of them, but more for him. She knows sometimes he doesn’t spend the night or even come over, because it’s too hard to the skirt the edges of sex like they do. They’re not teenagers. This isn’t anyones first time. They are experienced adults. 

School keeps them busy though. Jughead’s really connected with his workshop professor this quarter, Prof. Cruise, although Jughead always calls him James. Jughead is finished with his thesis, because his thesis is part of his book, in manuscript form. Since his book is ready to be published there is no reason to workshop it anymore. 

Instead he’s been working hard at coming up with an idea for a new book, and writing short stories in the meantime, so he will have something to workshop. James has actually been very helpful in terms of coming up with potential ideas for a second novel.

A number of writers have now mentioned the curse of the second book to him, and that’s made him nervous. 

Betty’s been busy submitting to magazines and literary journals and now she has an essay forthcoming in Granta, which she’s happy about.

She has also been working on her thesis. She wants all of the essays her thesis contains to be cohesive in some way, but it takes a while to find the right mix. Something keeps feeling off and Jughead’s tries to help, but he’s too positive. 

Kay and Mia are able to help a little, but they are both mired down by their own creative doubts and second guesses to give Betty the sort of insight she really needs. 

At coffee one rainy Saturday, Lucas is the one to tell her that she should focus on crime in terms of the victims and not the perpetrators. She already has most of the essays written for that theme, but there is one more she could write, that would really round it out. It really feels like unlocking a door. 

That night Betty and Jughead go out to drinks to celebrate, and she feels filled with joy, jittery with it. There is only a week left before they launch their issue of the literary journal at a swanky bar in the city. Then a week after that they hand in their thesis’s and two weeks later they will graduate. 

The end feels so close now, like a rainbow, it is visible, but doesn’t seem real exactly. 

“What are you grinning about?” Betty asks, after they find their way into a shadowy booth.

Jughead smiles. “I actually got a secondary interview to teach at City College. It would be full time. Not tenure track of course, but..”

“That’s amazing.” Betty says, sliding over to his side of the booth and giving him a hug, and then a singular kiss. They are both reticent about PDA, a fact Betty is grateful for. “When is it?”

“Tuesday.”

Betty can’t help but smile. It feels like another bit of their future is slotting into place. They will both stay in the area. Jughead had applied all over the country over Christmas break and Betty had felt this abstract pressure about his potential move, while she had fully committed to applying within the region. 

They talk a little bit about the ins and outs of the interview. Betty stays on the same side of the booth as Jughead and it feels good to have their legs pressed together like this. Her hand rests casually on his thigh. 

While talking about the semester and about Kay and Maya, Betty keeps getting distracted by Jughead. She feels so connected to him, both physically and mentally that by the time they are on their second drink and deep into a discussion on the modern interpretation of noir, she feels like a cloud, above everything else, but him. Safe and content. 

As that thought passes through her mind he presses his hand gently against her neck and moves her into a kiss. This one would never be described as chaste except sarcastically. 

* * *

Jughead wakes up in Betty’s bed. The walls of her bedroom are distinctly blue, and she’s actually bothered to hang art. Unlike his room which doesn’t reflect him at all, this room reflects her. 

He’s woken up here before. They’ve been dating for over two months now, and sleeping here was part of his routine. Usually though his body would be on edge.

Today he feels satisfied, more than that actually. He feels like nothing could ever go wrong. Jughead appreciates the heat of Betty’s body snuggled in next to his, the little spoon. Her breathing still in the slow and steady rhythm of sleep. 

This is the woman he loves. He’s not going to tell her when she wakes up though. The timing is all wrong. Jughead can’t tell her yet, he doesn’t want her to link his confession of love with sex. He doesn’t want to cheapen it that way. 

It’s not like last night is when he figured out that he’d loved her. He’d known for a while. Since the last break, probably. He would have told her earlier. But that required bravery, and the timing would have been wrong that way as well. He doesn’t think she was ready to hear those words then, he thinks she is now though. 

She stirs in her arms, and rolls away from him. Her body is no longer covered in blankets. He can see that she’s only wearing one of his old t-shirts.

He lets out an exaggerated sigh and her eyes snap open. She’s shocked by his presence for a second and then she reaches out with her hand to hold his.

Betty has told him what happened before, the one time she tried to keep sex casual, how she had panic attacks after, so he’s nervous. Last night was so good he has a hard time putting it into words, but it is even more important to him that this morning she feels safe and whole. 

She doesn’t say anything, instead she kisses him first on the forehead and then on the neck, till they’re all wrapped up in eachother again, and he can’t think at all. It all comes down to his body, to the joy that travels through it.

Later Betty makes waffles, and they go for a long walk by the river. It’s there, by the banks, watching two ornerary swans snap at each other, that he says ”I love you”, and she smiles up at him, and says “I love you, too.” The love between them is that easy to feel, to say. An exchange like this would be unimaginable to Jughead a year ago.

It is the perfect day, the perfect weekend actually, but on Monday they’re back in class, and on Tuesday they have the second to last literary journal meeting, and they all have to suggest who will be on staff next year, and Jughead selects two first years to be in charge of fiction. Betty chooses one of the poetry editors to take over the literary journal as a whole. No one disputes anyones choices and they all go out for Thai food after. 

It’s a little strange at first, the only person at the table who doesn’t know that Jughead and Betty are dating is Kevin. It’s funny, but for such a gossip he can be surprisingly slow to pick up on things.

But halfway through the dinner Kevin notices that their hands are entwined and his jaw actually drops and he says “I was telling everyone all quarter that you two were just friends and you are in fact fuck buddies.”

Jughead can feel Betty’s hand tense at the phrase fuck buddies. He takes a deep breath before saying. “Betty’s my girlfriend, actually.”

“Oh.” Kevin says. “But everyone told me you don’t do girlfriends.”

“Betty is not everyone.” Jughead says, taking a bite of his pad thai.

“But aren't you a lesbian?” Kevin asks.

Betty replies rather sharply “I am bisexual.” There is a huff of air as if to imply obviously and Jughead gives her hand a squeeze.

“And you just figured that out?” Kevin asks.

“No, I figured that out at fourteen actually.” Betty says this in a tone of voice that does not encourage additional discussion. 

“Ok, ok.” Kevin says with a head shake. 

Kay mercifully switches the topic to what they’re all doing post graduation. Kevin already has a job lined up at the American Academy of Poets. Kay has a self proclaimed “shitty adjunct gig”, and Jughead is still waiting to hear back from the second interview at the Community College. 

Betty just received an interview opportunity with The Paris Review. When she mentions it to the group, Jughead notes jealousy flare in Kevin’s eye, but he can’t really blame Kevin. It’s a pretty enviable opportunity. 

Jughead knows that now that Kevin knows about Betty and he, the whole campus will know before the weekend. People may have suspected before, but this will be definitive news.

Later that night in bed, Betty tells Jughead that she’s nervous about it, but he doesn’t feel the same way. He feels so proud, so happy that he’s with the woman next to him. As he’s thinking that, she moves her leg so it is covering his and she props her head on his chest. 

“I love you.” Betty says.

“You have my whole heart.” Jughead says, and then because he’s feeling safe and brave. “Is it weird being with a man?”

Betty shifts her head so she can look at him. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you’ve been with women, before is it weird to be with a man?”

Betty lifts her head and shakes it slightly. “It’s not nearly that straight forward. For one thing I wasn’t with all women before, I was with individuals, and now I’m with you, Jughead. Every partner is different. It’s not just a gendered thing. For example I could say the way you keep the toilet seat lifted is annoying, and blame it on you being a male, but it’s not something either Fred or Archie do, probably because they’re more used to living with a woman.”

“Ok.” Jughead says. 

“Like maybe in general men are messier than women, but you are definitely neater than Valerie.”

“You lived with a messy women?” Jughead asks. Betty’s apartment is always approaching impeccable in terms of cleanliness. 

“It wasn’t easy. I’d say it was one of our biggest areas of disagreement.” 

There is a comfortable silence, although Jughead still feels like his question isn’t entirely answered.

“With sex, i’m not sure what’s you, and what is more general male thing. I mean some things are obviously gendered, but others might not be. It’s really good between us though.” and that Jughead realizes is the answer he was really seeking. “Although it will get better.”  
“What do you mean?” Jughead says. He hasn’t said this to Betty, he thinks it would make her uncomfortable, but the sex they’ve had together is wonderful. It’s so intense, sometimes he struggles to maintain a sense of self during it, and he thinks that’s a surprisingly good thing.

“In my experience, the longer you’re with someone, the more compatible it is. The more comfortable you get to experiment.” 

“Oh.” Jughead says. “I’m a little skeptical.” He also wonders what she means by experiment, but he’s a little nervous to clarify.

“You’ll see, or I hope you will.” Betty says. Jughead starts to drift off to sleep than. Her head heavy on his chest. 

The next day on campus Jughead discovers that he should not have been as cavalier about Kevin spreading the news about Betty and he dating. 

It’s not like anyone slaps him, but some of the girls he’s slept with, more than he cares to think about, shoot daggers at him. As least no one says anything, until he runs into Lara at lunch. He’s eating bad pizza with Matt in the corner of the cafeteria when she approaches them.

Lara has a look on her face that is a weird mixture of smug and furious. She walks right up to him and says “I was right about you and Betty.”

“I didn’t know that at the time.” Jughead says. The only way forward as far as he is concerned is honesty. 

Lara looks skeptical but leaves without saying anything else.

Matt who witnesses the whole thing can’t stop laughing after she leaves. It’s not like Matt hasn’t slept around, he has, but because he’s not committed to anyone yet, he hasn’t dealt with the consequences. 

After meeting with James to talk about the new short story Jughead is working on, Jughead suddenly realizes that Betty might be going through something similar today, although unlike him, she bares no responsibility for this. He texts her to ask how she’s holding up, and she sends back a smiley face emoji and then a text that says coffee with a question mark after it.

Soon they’re at a starbucks sitting at one of the small tables. Betty came straight from work, so she’s wearing what Jughead likes to think of as her PI uniform - blue jeans, a neutral colored long sleeve t-shirt, and a nondescript pea coat. Nothing that would stand out or call attention to itself. 

Betty listens as he tells her the Lara story, and the rest of his awkward encounters that day. Because Betty had spent all day off campus, she didn’t have any stories to share about weird conversations, although she had managed to prevent two thieves from leaving with ill gotten books. 

The next day on campus a few women warn Betty about Jughead, a fact she tells him afterwards. But their warnings don’t seem to bother her, because the situation is different. He had made it clear beforehand that nothing was serious with them. He’d done the opposite with her.

Still it’s a long week, and Jughead finds himself dreading the literary journal launch instead of looking forward to it. At least till he walks into the bar that’s hosting it. He’s never really seen Betty dressed up before, there hasn’t really been a reason for her to dress up.

On campus she wears pants and a shirt, the nature of the pants and the shirt change if she’s running or not. Even at the reading she gave last quarter, she wore jeans and an expensive looking sweater. 

When he meets her at the bar, she’s wearing heels, and a blue dress that’s simple but shows off her body, both in terms of what it covers and what it does not. Her legs, always inspiring are even more so in heels. 

“You look beautiful.” He says and when she turns towards him, she’s glowing. “Did you get good news?” He asks, before she can say anything.

“I got the job at the Paris Review.” 

Jughead is filled with joy, but not surprise. He’s sure it was a competitive position, but he’s still not surprised Betty got the job. She’s a wonderful writer and editor, and she’s had a string of recent successes.

Instead of congratulating her with words, he kisses her. Someone clears their throat loudly behind them, and Jughead turns to see who it is. It’s Kevin who says “No one needs to see another hetero couple kissing.” Betty just shakes her head. 

“Congratulations.” Jughead says. 

“Congratulations on what?” Kevin asks apparently having missed that part. They get him up to speed and he and Betty start talking about how their soon to be jobs. Jughead tries not to feel anxious about his lack of one.

Jughead still has part of his advance, and he’s got a few offers for adjunct work, but he feels like holding out for full time. He doesn’t want to have to piece things together. He wants a straightforward schedule. According to his agent he’s going to need one, so that in the spring when he starts doing the real work of launching a book, they can easily schedule travel and signing around classes. 

The bar fills up quickly. There will be seven readers, three very well known, including one, Max Smith, who Jughead really admires, and then the journal will be available for sale. Betty is the MC, and she greets each of the readers equally warmly, regardless of if they are well known are not. 

Jughead introduces himself to Max Smith, but the man refuses to make eye contact with him, so focused is Max on Betty’s legs. Jughead tries to shake off the uncomfortable feeling as Betty heads to the mic and introduces the readers. 

The uncomfortable feeling diminishes during Max’s reading. There is something about his writing style that appeals to Jughead on a deep level. Maybe Max was just nervous earlier. After all even famous writers have pre reading jitters. 

At the end of the reading Betty takes the stage and talks about the literary journal and how much it has come to mean to her. At the very end she introduces the editor for next year, and there is loud applause. 

After that Jughead is so busy selling copies he doesn’t see Betty for a half hour and when he finally switches out with Kay, he finds her talking to Max. 

Max’s body languages shifts as soon as Jughead approaches. He goes from talking in an animated engaged way to being quiet and still. 

“Max, this is Jughead.” Betty says.

“Hi.” Max says, actually making eye contact this time. Jughead notices how Betty doesn’t say my boyfriend, but also how she makes it clear they are together with her body language. She loops an arm around his back.

“Harper Collins is releasing his first book next summer.”

“Oh?” Max says, standing up straighter. “So you’re an actual author, not just some rich kid with an MFA.”

Jughead quips “I don’t think i’ve ever been accused of being rich before.”

Max laughs, and Jughead wonders if he’s a good guy after all. Maybe a little standoffish, but he’s famous, he has reason to be that way. 

“What’s your novel about?” 

“It’s sort of a coming of age story, about a young boy recruited into a gang. It focuses on intergenerational poverty and the links it has with crime, and how the justice system often fails individuals.”

“Oh.” Max seems a little impressed by this. “How did you come up with it.”

“I lived it mostly. There are fictional elements of course, but it’s mostly rooted in how I grew up.”

Max nods, and opens his mouth to say something when Kevin interrupts to introduce himself as a fan. Kevin asks Max to sign his book, and suddenly there is a line behind Kevin waiting for their own autographs. Before Max starts to sign the work, he slips Betty a card with his phone number on it. 

Betty takes it, and once Max has turned away and is talking to a fan, Betty flips the card over to reveal the note scrawled on the other side that says “Call me when you dump him.”

“Mother fucker.” Jughead says as quietly as he can manage. 

“Ignore him.” Betty says, pressing her hand into his. “He’s just used to getting what he wants.”

What Jughead wants is to talk about this more, but Kay calls Betty over to help find more change for sales of the Literary Journal. He orders an IPA at the bar. Before he even manages to take a sip, Kevin is by his side.

“What did Max give your girl?”

“She’s not a possession.” Jughead says, and then after a pause he adds, “His phone number and a note asking her to call him when she dumps me.”

Kevin doesn’t even seem outraged. He just laughs. “Par for the course.”

“What course?”

“The being a famous writer course.” Kevin says. “The big names think they can get away with everything, drunk readings, consequence free impregnations, etc.”

“Really?” Jughead asks. He can’t imagine behaving that way if he ever got famous. He knew that the more famous writers who were teachers at school tended to be more eccentric, a little crazy even, like Prof. Green, but he didn’t think this was true of writers outside of their own MFA bubbler. In fact he hoped it was not.

“Not everyone. But it happens.” Kevin gestures at the pulitzer prize winning poet who had read first his evening, Stanley Lomis. He was an older man with wild gray hair ‘He’s propositioned two female poets so far, and he has a wife thirty years his junior waiting at home.”:

“Hell no.” Jughead says, taking a swig of his beer. “Sometimes I wonder what i’ve gotten myself into.” Kevin just laughs.

Two weeks later, after he hands in his thesis, Jughead takes advantage of James’s office hours. James is one of the best writers he knows, but also one of the best people. He seems in every way like an utterly normal middle aged man to Jughead. He has two kids at home, a wife, an irish setter, and three best selling novels. 

Jughead unloads the whole store on James who just laughs and says “Sure, there are writers like that out there, but it’s not everyone. They just stand out in such a small community. But sometimes the community nurtures the outrageous behavior, by accepting it, by dismissing it as funny, even though it’s not good. ”

That night Betty throws a celebratory party at her place. Everyone has handed in their thesis’s, and while it’s not officially over yet, with a few weeks of classes to go before graduation, it almost feels like it is. 

The party is too small to really be called a party. But Mia and Kay are there, as well as Matt and Lucas. Betty’s ordered in pizza and baked a chocolate cake that looks delicious. Jughead can vouch for the frosting but Betty hasn’t let him sample the cake himself. 

About halfway through the dinner Jughead gets up to get more pizza and so does Lucas. When they’re together in the small kitchen Lucas says to Jughead, quiet enough so no one else can hear “You seem good together. I didn’t expect that.”

Jughead wants to snap at Lucas for a second, and least that’s what his baser instincts encourage him to do, but he doesn’t. Instead he says “You’re a good friend Lucas.” Lucas shrugs. 

Jughead has two beers, just enough to relax, but not enough to feel out of control, in any way. Kay and Mia start making out on the couch, and Matt stares at them. Jughead throws a scrunched up napkin at his head. 

Lucas leaves first, and then Matt. By then it’s almost two in the morning. Kay and Mia linger for a while longer, gossiping about a writer's retreat scandal that Jughead hadn’t heard about before.

By the time they leave, Jughead just wants to go to bed, but Betty’s cleaning up and he could hardly let her do that alone, so they wipe the counter down together and he thinks to himself how he even enjoys doing this with her. 

They fall asleep quickly, but they wake up together. He’s the big spoon and she’s the little spoon and he thinks, he could hold her like that for the rest of his life. He dismisses the thought, it’s too soon for such things.

But then she shifts in his arms and rolls so she’s on her back, her green eyes looking at him, bright and full, she uses her arm to tug him over so he’s on top of her. His body pressed against hers. He’s in boxers, she’s just in a t-shirt. 

“I love you.” She says and he thinks it isn’t too soon to know that he wants the rest of his life to be spent by her side, but it too soon to know if it will work out that way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment! Your comments keep me going!
> 
> Just one more chapter to go, then perhaps a coda. Graduation is up next!


	8. The Summer after School

Jughead is scanning the crowd for Toni. He’s wearing his gown already but not his hat or his hood. Then he spots her, her purple hair stands out as she walks around a slow moving elderly couple. 

She’s dressed up in a short black dress with an embellished collar. It’s not her usual look at all. 

“No shredded fishnets?” Jughead teases as he hugs her. 

“Not today.” Toni says. “Where am I going to sit?”

“With the Andrews, if you don’t mind?” Jughead says. Everyone who graduated received four tickets to give family and friends so that they could attend. Needless to say, Betty and Jughead had given away most of their tickets, but Archie and Fred were here. Teresa had tried to come, but her schedule hadn’t allowed for it. 

Toni was the only person Jughead could think of inviting. He hated the idea of Toni sitting on her own for the event though. 

“Of course. Archie already texted me to sit with them, I just wasn’t sure if there was arranged seating or not.”

“There isn’t.” Jughead says, leading her towards Fred and Archie. “I’m going to have to go in a minute. I still need to get my hood.”

“Your hood?” Toni says skeptically. 

“You’ll see it soon enough.” Jughead said leading her over to Archie and Fred. Betty had pointed out where they were sitting earlier, but he’d yet to spend time with either of them since he and Betty had started dating. 

Jughead had to admit that he was a little nervous about how Fred might interact with him. It was one thing for Fred to approve of him as a friend, and another as a romantic partner.

“Hi.” Jughead says, to both men, who were focused on talking to each other. They notice Jughead then and stand up. Only then does Jughead realize how alike both men look. Archie is so clearly Fred’s son. Betty must have really stood out growing up. 

Archie hugs Jughead and Toni warmly, and Jughead introduces Fred to Toni. 

“Sorry, I’ve got to go.” Jughead says.

“I have something for Betty actually, can you give it to her?” Fred asks, extending an envelope to Jughead.

“It depends how on schedule everything is. I’m supposed to line up, and Cooper is nowhere near Jones in the alphabet but i’ll try,” Jughead says. 

“Thanks.” Fred says, and Jughead runs, gown and all to the room where all the other students are lined up. He picks out his hood and hat and then goes to his place in line. 

He throws the hood on and then relizeses it looks all wrong. No one seems too concerned about being in line yet. Lots of students are clumped into groups chatting still.

Betty’s near the front of the non-fiction line talking to the girl in front of her. Betty’s hood is on perfectly and she’s wearing high heels. Whatever dress she’s wearing isn’t visible underneath the graduation gown. 

“Sorry to interrupt. But I need help.” Jughead says.

Betty turns away from the girl and to him, and laughs. “It’s on backwards.”

“I figured that much out.” Jughead says.

“Is that you admitting that you’re just using this as an excuse to see me?” Betty whispers as she starts adjusting the hood. Turning it and straightening it at the same time. 

“Don’t hold it against me, love.” 

Betty presses a kiss against his cheek and then pulls away “Not today. It’s all adjusted now.”

“Oh, I almost forgot, Fred gave me this.” Jughead says, pulling the note out of his pocket.  
Betty opens it and laughs, then shows Jughead the contents of the envelope, a photo from Betty’s kindergarten graduation. Betty’s missing two teeth and her hair is in piggy tails. Her graduation cap is made out of construction board.

“Oh.” Jughead says, and he feels briefly a tug of envy. Any photos that were taken during his childhood are probably long gone, and no adult in his life is thoughtful enough to bring one to graduation. 

Betty must notice his expression because she places one hand over his heart and says “You are loved.” 

It feels like a blessing and he takes those words back to the line with them. 

The graduation ceremony is mostly boring, although he has a brief flare of adrenaline when he crosses the stage. He almost falls asleep during the dean’s speech. But the famous actress who gives the commencement speech does a surprisingly good job and soon they are on the front lawn with all the other graduates waiting to reunite with their families. 

Their coats and hats have already been returned to the room they borrowed them from, but their hoods still firmly in hand.

Their teachers are out on the lawn. Jughead can’t wait to introduce James to Toni and Prof. Howe. Betty steers them away from Prof. Green whispering in Jughead’s ear “I’m pretty sure Archie would yell at her, and no one wants that.”

Prof. Howe comes over to them, smiling before he hugs them. “So are you together now?” he asks.

“Yes.” Betty says, and it’s not the word itself that means so much but the way she says it, so confidently. 

“That’s good.” Prof. Howe says before asking Jughead how the book is coming. There is not much for Jughead to share about that. The advanced readers copy is going out in a few months, and Jughead can’t really change anything about the book till after that, but even then, he doesn’t think there will be a need for major revisions. 

Betty spots Toni and the Andrews and waves them over. After that it’s a solid hour of talking to people in a formal setting. Mostly friends and some professors. Everyone wants to take photographs. Lara passes with her family and refuses to make eye contact. They meet Lucas’s parents, and they are as nice as he is. 

It’s all a little overwhelming and by the time Betty reminds him of their lunch reservation, Jughead couldn’t be more relieved for the excuse to leave. Still as they walk towards the Italian restaurant, he is suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling of loss. He will never see most of those people again. 

He takes a deep breath and keeps walking, content to hear Toni ramble on about how cute the commencement speech actress was. 

He’s nervous about spending time with Fred in such a formal setting. He wants to come across as a good boyfriend. Someone Fred can trust to be a good partner for Betty. Fred is currently too caught up talking to Betty to notice Jughead at all.

They are seated right away at the restaurant. There are a number of other families celebrating around them, but no one Jughead knows.

It isn’t till their waitress arrives at the table that Jughead realizes this might be a more exciting lunch than he had initially planned. The waitress is a short raven haired girl, with a polished appearance, and big knowing eyes. “Hi, I’m Veronica and i’ll be your server today. The special is lamb with mushroom and spinach.”

Neither Archie nor Toni say a word. They just take their menus. But Jughead notices the way their eyes flash in response to Veronica. Betty must too, because she leans over and whispers “Uh-oh” in his ear. 

Fred doesn’t seem to notice, instead turning towards Jughead and saying “I heard you got a job since I last saw you.”

“Yes, I just signed a two year contract with City College last week. I’ll be teaching three classes a semester there, starting in the fall.”

Jughead’s trying to sound upbeat about. Out of all the interviews he did for various jobs this was the one that excited him most in theory, that was until he saw the contract. In terms of how much they were willing to pay him, he would have done better cobbling together adjunct gigs. 

At this point though it was too late for him to do that. He was stuck on the path that he was on. At least there were benefits that came with the fulltime job, it would be good to not lose health coverage. 

In the end he’d agreed to sign only a one year contract, hoping that sometime in the next year, with this experience under his belt he could get something better. It meant at least one more year of living with roommates though.

Betty knew all this, of course, but Jughead hadn’t really let others in. They all still thought he’d gotten his dream job. He wasn’t ready to bring up all this to Fred either. It was too complicated. 

“All creative writing?” Fred asks.

“I wish. One class a quarter will be creative, the other two will be general composition, which I mostly blocked out from my own undergraduate experience.”

“Me too.” Archie says. “Way to make me look bad, both of you. I graduated four years ago and I still don’t have a serious adult job like either of you.”

Jughead tries not to show a visual reaction. His job certainly seems serious, but he’s pretty sure Archie makes more per week pouring drinks. 

“Me neither.” Toni says. “Although I have an interview with a PI firm Betty connected me with.”

“Good luck, although honestly I think you’ll get the job no problem.” Betty says.”I’m actually going to miss my old job.”

Veronica re-appears at the table and asks what they would like to order. Jughead and Betty both order their regular dishes, Fred orders gnocchi, then Toni asks “What’s your favorite dish?”

Veronica makes eye contact with her, “I really love the lamb shank.”

“I want what you love.” Toni says, with an obvious wink.

“Me too.” Archie says.

Jughead rolls his eyes, Veronica just laughs. Once she leaves Betty says “I thought you guys were each other's wing person?”

“Did you see her?’ Archie asks. 

“Yes.” Betty says shaking her head and shrugging.

“I forgot, she’s totally not your type.” 

“Wait, what?” Jughead says.

“Betty’s attracted to people her size, or taller. Val was actually my height.” Jughead takes that in. He is significantly taller than Betty, so she’s stayed on trend for that at least. 

“Archie, I’d rather you not spend my graduation celebration telling Jughead about my taste in women.” Betty says, but there is a twinkle in her eye.

“And I for the record would rather not hear or see any of this.” Fred says, but he doesn’t seem serious. 

But all the teasing breaks the ice. It makes Jughead calmer, less stiff and nervous. 

Veronica adds an unexpected dimension. Both Archie and Toni are unabashed in their flirtations with her. They compliment what seems like every part of her appearance, and the job she’s doing. Veronica seems to enjoy the attention from both parties. 

After a while Fred, Jughead, and Betty make a point of ignoring Archie and Toni’s behavior and instead talk about Teresa, Andrews construction, and a hypothetical plan for Betty and Jughead to spend Thanksgiving in Riverdale. Toni rolls her eyes at the last one. 

Usually making a plan for that far ahead would make Jughead nervous. Normally he would assume that he would be long gone by then. This time he knew he wanted to stick around. His biggest concern was that Betty would still want him then.

He couldn’t read her mind. She gave him every indicator that she was serious about him, but she had been here before, as she liked to tease him, she was the one who knew about serious relationships. He knew she was the person for him, but he wasn’t sure how to go about finding out that she felt the same way. For one it was too soon, as Toni kept reminding him. 

Halfway through his plate of pasta, Jughead thinks of a question he’s been meaning to ask for a long time. Ever since he knew Betty well enough to wish that she’d always been a part of his life. “What was Betty like as a child?” He asks Fred.

Fred smiles “At what point?”

“Any, I guess.” Jughead shrugs. He hadn’t thought that far. He just wanted to know more about her, from the person that knew her best back then. He’d heard a little from Archie over the summer, but all those memories were affected by the fact that Archie was a child back then, too. 

“Betty was always good at sports. Softball and running particularly. Her mother never encouraged it, but when she moved in with us, it just became part of her life. You’re dating a three time track and field champion, not that she’d ever tell you that.”

Betty blushes and hides behind her glass of wine. “Seriously Fred, don’t tell him anymore.”

“She was also really obsessed with Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, The Famous Five. Name any detective book aimed at kids and she had it. At the time I thought it was a passing phase, but clearly she never got over it.”

“I teased her so much when she started PI training.” Archie adds

“Ok, two can play this game.” Betty says, exhaling loudly. “Toni, what was Jughead like as a kid?”

“No!” Jughead protests, but it’s too late. He opened the wrong can of worms.

“How old of a kid?” Toni asks, a serious expression on her face.

“Anywhere between eight and twelve.”

“Ok.” Toni says and she’s silent for a moment as if she’s really thinking about it, and then this gleam appears in her eye, and Jughead knows he’s in trouble. “Jughead was never one for school, or sports, but he liked reading.”

Betty nods and Jughead almost exhales with relief. Then Toni says “and he was also a bit of a pyromaniac.” 

“Oh!” Fred exclaims, and Jughead can’t stop himself from kicking Toni’s shins under the table. Toni telling Betty this was one thing but Toni telling Betty this in front of her father, was another thing entirely. 

The kick doesn’t slow Toni down though (it was really more of a tap than a kick), “At first it was just little things, but then he got caught trying to burn the school down.”

“It was a shed, Toni. One single shed.” Jughead protests. He knows she’ll be bringing this up the rest of his life regardless. 

“Deliberately?” Fred says.

“Not really. It was more a matter of curiosity. I didn’t actually think about the consequences. I was nine at the time. I was suspended from school.”

“Then you and Betty have a lot in common on that front. She was suspended from school a lot between the ages of nine and eleven.” Fred says with a shrug. “Although it was for fighting not fire. Archie too.”

“Only twice.” Archie protests.

At first Jughead is surprised by this information, but that’s only before he plugs it into the personal timeline of Betty’s life. Of course she’d be acting up then. 

The rest of the dinner went well and at the very end when Veronica was picking up Fred’s credit card to run it, Toni and Archie exchange grins, and Toni leans forward towards Veronica.

“Which of us would you rather date?” Toni asks. Veronica, who had seemed unflappable earlier, looks nervous for a second, and then a calm returns to her. She looks from Toni’s face to Archie’s. 

“Is this for a bet?” Veronica asks.

“You could call it that.” Archie says with a shrug. 

“You.” Veronica says pointing at Toni “I’ve never dated anyone with purple hair before.” She leaves to run the credit card.

“Damnit.” Archie mumbles, but he doesn’t look too broken up.

“I win again Andrews.” Toni says, with a smirk.

“It only counts if you get a number.” Archie reminds her.

“Wait, you’ve done this before?” Fred says. 

“Just ignore them.” Jughead says. “They’re a little too competitive.”

“I can see that.”

Veronica returns and without Toni asking she slips her a piece of paper with a number on it. Toni actually sticks her tounge out at Archie as if they are still children. Jughead can’t help but laugh a little. 

Just like that the pomp and circumstance of graduation are over, and while Jughead has the summer more or less off, outside of preparing to teach, Betty starts working full time at The Paris Review. 

Now that they’re out of graduate school, there’s this strange period of adjustment. Jughead’s still working part time at the on-campus gym, but Betty can no longer work out there because she isn’t a student, and unlike Archie, she’s not comfortable bending the rules. But other than that and working on his book Jughead has no time commitments. 

Between Betty’s commute to work (an hour each way) and her full time job, Jughead only sees her late at night and on the weekends. Jughead tries not to complain about her work schedule, but he misses her.

He keeps telling himself that once his job starts, their schedules will balance eachother out, but he can’t help but worry about the situation. What if his schedule and her’s clash more once he starts working, then he’ll never see her. 

It doesn’t help that Betty doesn’t seem to like having him over more than one night at a time. She never officially tells him this, but he notices that while she’s fine with him staying there a lot, even as frequently as every other night, she makes it clear he’s not welcome to stay over twice in a row. She makes an exception for her birthday, but that’s it. 

She can’t exactly stay at his place because his roommate situation is less than ideal. 

All in all it’s going good between them. They spend a lot of time together reading, writing, and watching movies, she’s even negotiated him into a run or two. They go for hikes every other weekend and Jughead has grown to crave the peace the woods bring.

They discover that they’re lucky to have made the transition to post grad life so easily when late one Friday night Betty gets a call from sobbing Kay. Betty can barely figure out the call, but she pays for Kay to take an uber over, and in person the whole thing is easier to figure out. 

Mia dumped Kay for a man she started seeing in late June. It’s a betrayal on multiple levels, and Jughead feels awkward for just being there, but it’s too late for him to head to his own apartment. 

He say hi to Kay and then goes to bed. Betty crawls in with him hours later. He holds her in the little spoon position.

“Can I say i’m not surprised Mia’s a bit of a bitch.” Jughead says.

“Jug, we’ve only heard half of the story.” Betty protests half heartedly. “I feel for Kay though.”

“Does it seem like everyone who dated in grad school is breaking up?” Jughead says. He’s been thinking about that on and off ever since he heard the news about Mia, but only now does he feel prepared to bring it up. 

Because it’s not just Mia and Kay who have split since graduate school, but a number of the couples they knew tangentially have bit the dust, the post MFA lifestyle presumably getting the best of them.

“A little.” Betty says, “I’m not entirely surprised.”

“Why not?”

“Most of those were relationships of convenience. Where two people in the same program ended up dating, because of proximity more or less, and now the thing that brought them together in the first place is gone.”

“Do you think we’re going to break up too?” Jughead says. He can’t believe he’s voicing this fear out loud, but Betty’s helped him be that kind of brave. 

Betty just laughs. “Hell no. Our relationship, the earliest version of it romantically, was not a matter of convenience. I had a non dating pact with myself for one, but there were lots of other factors that we had to overcome just to be together.”

Jughead has to agree with her on that one, and her confidence gives him more confidence. After all the biggest problem with their relationship is just that they don’t seem to ever find enough time to spend together, even when they see eachother most days. 

Two weeks later, they are on a museum date. Betty’s admiring a Klimt, and Jughead’s viewing a Schiele when a woman's voice loudly proclaims “Betty” and Jughead turns towards the voice at the same time Betty does. 

The woman who said Betty’s name is tall and beautiful, with gorgeous hair, and a casual but curated style. 

“Val” Betty exclaims loudly. Jughead feels a lurch in his gut. This is Betty’s ex. She looks different than he expected, more vibrant and edgy. 

Both women stare as if they are taking note of changes in each other.

“What are you doing here?” Betty asks.

“I’m here with my brother.” Val says. “He’s sketching in the garden right now.”

“How is Trev?” Jughead is reminded that Betty had a life with this women, knew her own whole family, was probably considered part of it, for a time at least. 

“He’s good. He got into grad school. He’ll have an MFA too if everything works out.”  
Betty nods. “What are you doing here?” Val asks.

The question makes Jughead nervous. Betty hasn’t glanced at him since Val caught her attention. Probably just because she was caught off guard, still he feels a bit forgotten, or rather he did. Now Betty has a smile on her face, and is grinning at him. 

“I’m here on a date actually.” Betty says, gesturing towards Jughead for Val’s benefit. ”Val this is my boyfriend Jughead, Jughead this is my ex, Valerie.”

Val looks shocked, but she nods at Jughead.

“Are you OK?” Betty asks. 

Val looks up at Jughead, whose only slightly taller than her, and smiles, “Don’t be an idiot. You should know you’re dating one of the best people in the world.”

Jughead laughs. He can’t imagine anyone he used to be with describing him that way. “Oh, I know.”

Val smiles back, but then without saying anything else she leaves the room. Only then does Betty exhale.

“Are you ok?” Jughead says, switching his focus to her.

Betty nods. “It just feels so strange to see someone you once loved, and not love them anymore.”

* * *

Betty’s exhausted. She’s been putting the finishing touches on the latest issue of The Paris Review. Or at least the Letters and Essay section that she’s in charge of. She had to skip lunch today because she’s seeing an apartment at 5:00. 

The apartment, which she’s heading to right now is a less than a 10 minute walk from the office. This would transform her day. She might actually have time to write if she wasn’t spending almost two hours on a train. 

Instead of walking to the apartment, she’s half running in her work shoes, to meet the real estate agent on time. But as she turns the corner, there he is, Owen the junior partner at the agency she’s working with. Owen might be selling condos and houses one day, but for now he is just in charge of renting out apartments.

Betty’s been working with Owen for a month now. But most of the apartments he’s shown her are places she would never want to live in. There was a toilet in one of the kitchens, and the other had four rooms in less than five hundred square feet.

Over the phone Owen sounded pretty confident about this place. Betty stops walking, smooths her hair with a hand and then walks over to Owen, who is preoccupied with poking at his phone.

“Hi. Sorry I’m late.” Betty says.

Owen looks up and smiles. “Just by a minute. That doesn’t even count.” 

He unlocks the main door of the building and then leads Betty up two flights of stairs. The building as a whole seems well maintained. He opens the door to the apartment that she’s considering and right away she’s pretty sure she will take it. 

There is actual light coming through the windows and a stove with no toilet anywhere in sight. Still she does her due diligence. She asks questions and checks to make sure the tap for the bathtub and the shower head work. 

The bedroom is smaller than she’s like, but she can work for it. She signs the paperwork on the spot. 

She then rushes back to her current apartment to see Jughead. He’s already there when she enters, throwing together a simple stir fry. He’s not much of a cook, but he can be trusted to make a few basics, and she gave him her keys months ago. 

“I signed a lease.” She says enthusiastically, when she enters. She can see his face fall for a second, before it’s transformed by a smile.

“That’s great.” Jughead says. But she can tell he only means it about seventy-five percent. He has seemed agitated all through her rental process but he hasn’t really told her why. There is a chance he doesn’t even know why, completely. 

It could be the fact that he also has to find an apartment in the city, closer to his place of work. She knows he’ll need a roommate again because his new job doesn’t pay that well and most of his advance went towards paying off student debt. Having a roommate doesn’t seem like such a big deal, since he only sleeps at home about half the time. 

Once he’s finished the food and they've taken it over to the sofa to eat, she shows him photos of the apartment. He seems suitably impressed. 

The stir fry he’s thrown together is surprisingly good and Betty goes to get seconds. Only then does he say in a quiet voice “Would you consider letting me move in with you?”

Betty’s shocked. She didn’t expect him to say that. They’ve been together half a year, and that seems too soon to be thinking about such things. She knows other people move in together that quickly, quicker even, but she thinks he must know her that well by now. She’s tried to make it clear that he’s welcome in his apartment but not all the time. 

She looks at Jughead. His gaze doesn’t meet hers though, instead he’s focused on the wall behind her.

They’ve talked about a lot of things since they’ve gotten together, he now knows her honest opinion on everything from sushi (fish should not be raw), to handcuffs (zip ties are just more effective for most things). But he doesn’t know this. She hasn’t explicitly talked to him about her opinions on cohabiting, but that doesn’t change the fact that she has them.

“Did I ever tell you how Val and I got together?” Betty asks him. He looks shocked by the apparent non-sequitur but he shakes his head, no.

“On the first day of college we were assigned as roommates. We got along right away. We became best friends within weeks. I always thought she was cute, but I thought of her as a straight girl with a boyfriend. Even after he dumped her over thanksgiving, I still thought of her that way.”

Jughead nods. She can tell how interested in this, how engaged he is, even though he still thinks she has changed the topic. She has not.

“Then after I came back from Christmas break, she kissed me and suddenly we were dating, and roommates. We lived together the whole time we were together, from that point on. I always felt like it put extra pressure on the situation but there wasn’t much I could do about it. But it was hard, going on a first date and then coming home with the person you were dating.”

“I can see that.” Jughead says. 

“I know we’re beyond the first date stage now. But I promised myself when Val and I broke up, that I wouldn’t cohabitate with someone till we had been together for two years, at least.”

Betty says that and immediately regrets it, because that wasn’t the real promise she made herself. Because she’s honest with Jughead, and so much has bloomed from that honesty she adds “Actually my exact words to myself were until I got married, but i’m willing to revise that.” 

She can’t help but suspect that even the word marriage makes Jughead nervous, given his family history.

“I see where you're coming from.” Jughead says. “I understand.” The tone he says this in makes it clear, he understands it but he wishes he didn’t. 

“I just never want to feel like we have to stay together for practical living space related reasons, when we are still figuring things out. In this city it’s expensive to live alone, and I get that it would be better to live with someone you love, than a random stranger. But when we do move in together, I want it be for more than practical reasons. I want it to be because we can’t imagine living without the other. I want us to have time being a couple that has their own space.” 

Jughead nods, he offers her a weak smile. “Ok. Why do I feel like you’re always putting the breaks on our relationship?”

Betty feels awful. “I’m not. I want us to continue to grow and to flourish. But we really need space and time to do that. Look, I don’t want to freak you out, but I plan to spend the rest of my life with you - that is what I want to do. Just thinking about that makes me happy - but I don’t want to get ahead of myself with that. I don’t want to push everything to go faster, just because I know the end goal. I want us to enjoy our time getting  
there together.”

She is focused on his face the whole time, she waits for him to panic when she tells him she wants to spend the rest of her life with him but instead of him looking nervous, he smiles at that. 

“I think I get it now.” He says. His face glowing in a way she hadn’t imagined possible a few minutes ago. 

“You do?” Betty says.

“I’ve known for a while that i’ve wanted to share my life with yours, and I think part of why I raised this whole question is I wasn’t sure if you felt the same way. But now I know you do. It feels like a huge relief.”

Jughead leans over and kisses her so quickly, that her lips get pushed back against her teeth for a second. But then she’s leaning over and kissing him back just as hard. 

Then he pulls back and takes off his shirt. She does the same, followed by her bra. Time is passing slowly now. He takes off his pants and she admires his leg muscles. The hiking must be paying off. 

She takes off her pants too. It’s funny and strange, doing all this in silence, in turns. She feels nervous about her body. Mostly when they see each other naked it’s darker, less exposed. Usually it’s just a quick glimpse of one another, or on the sheets.

She slips off her underwear and now feels entirely on display. But it’s not a bad feeling, surprisingly. Not with him. Jughead’s gaze feels soft and admiring. He’s staring at her as if she is something more than what she is, something more than human. 

He takes his underwear off too, Betty can’t help but admire him. This is her person. He looks nothing like she expected him too (he was a he for one). He turns slowly for her, and then gestures for her to do the same. When her back is to him she can’t help but wiggle her butt, playfully for a second before completing the circle.

It feels like this weird pause between them, the heated moments, and then now this spatial separation, without touch, it makes her feel admired but not loved. Then he reaches out and gently places a hand against her breast. 

Her body pulses with happiness just at that simple touch and she brushes her own hand down his side, till it rests on his hip bone. “Oh.” He says, softly, just loud enough for her to hear it. 

Later when they’re in bed together, his arm wrapped over her chest Jughead says “You’re right.”

“About what?” Betty says, wondering if it was about something big like moving in together or something small like which nearby chinese food place was better. 

“About sex.” Betty racks her brain for what she’s said about sex in the past that could be classified as right or wrong. He must sense her confusion because he clarifies. “When you said it got better over time, you were right.”

Betty laughs “Jug, it’s been six months. You ain’t seen nothing yet.” 

He flips her over and presses a series of kisses down her spine. 

“Let’s just say that nothing is already spectacular.”

When the summer is winding down, the evenings getting a touch cooler, they go away for a weekend in the woods. They read and hike, and Jughead brews strong coffee and they stay up way too late at night and talk and don’t talk and then talk again.

As Betty drives them back to the city, his hand rests lightly on her thigh. 

“Can I tell you that falling in love is a whole lot scarier than I thought it would be?” Jughead says.

Betty glances away from the road, and sees his smiling face.

“How so?”

“I just never realized how vulnerable it would make me. For my whole heart to reside in someone else’s body. In your body.”

Betty’s refocused on the road, but there is a smile on her face. “Trying to give Keller a run for his money?”

Jughead’s silent for a moment and Betty wonders if he missed the reference. But he hasn’t, because he protests “I am not a poet.”

“Sometimes you sound like one.” Betty jests and then more seriously she adds because it’s true and he should know. “You make me feel more vulnerable than anyone else. Before I think I always preserved a part of my heart for myself, but with you i’ve given everything.”

“Oh.” Jughead says.

“According to my therapist it’s a big fucking deal.” Betty says, feeling both heavy and light at the same time.

“Your therapist uses the word fucking?” 

Betty laughs, “No. But she thinks that i’m building something with you that’s important. Something that wasn’t possible before, when my birth family dominated so many of my thoughts. I just always thought they would determine my future. Now I’m sure they won’t.”

Jughead squeezes her thigh with the palm of his hand. “I want you to be my family someday.” He says softly, and Betty removes one hand from the wheel to wipe a tear away from the corner of her eye. 

The week that follows is busy. It’s the last before Jughead’s new job starts. After a summer of not having much to do he’s slammed with work he could have done earlier (Betty is trying so hard not point this out). Still on Friday when she opens the door to her apartment she finds him busy in the kitchen. 

“I’ve got news.” They both blurt out at the same time. 

Betty can’t imagine what his is, but she really wants to tell him hers, still she is polite. “You go first.”

“Toni got a PI job here, she’s moving here!”

“Wow! That’s amazing.” Betty loves the idea of being able to see Toni more often. She can’t believe how similar their news updates are though.

“What’s your news?”

“Archie got a job at a record label here. He’s moving too.”

“No way.” Jughead says. 

“Which one gets to be your roommate?” Betty asks. Jughead’s been searching for an apartment for over a month now, and most of the potential roommates he’s found could be classified as either creepy or gross. This would solve his issues.

“Why not both?” Jughead says. “Then i’d really save and no one would be mad at me for choosing the other.

“I think that would be too much, I don’t know what to call it, maybe dudebro energy?” 

“You have a terminal degree in writing and dudebro energy is the best phrase you could come up?” Jughead says with a laugh.

“Can you come up with a better one?” Betty says skeptically. He shakes his head. 

“I’d be ok with the dudebro energy, because you have the opposite. I could always come here and spend time with you.”

“What exactly is the opposite of dudebro energy?” Betty asks. 

“I don’t know. The master's degree is really failing us today.” 

Betty walks over to him, and he wraps his arms around her. “It really feels like everything's falling into place.” 

He presses his lips against hers in a kiss and then pulls back, his eyes bright as he says, “Yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An enormous thank you is owed to everyone who commented, kudo’d, or shared this story on tumblr. I’ve never written a multi-chapter that has received this kind of intense wonderful love before. So many of the comments on this have been beyond thoughtful. I am just so grateful. 
> 
> When I have a bad day, or a period of writing self doubt, I go back and read them, and they make everything so much better
> 
> Also I’m planning to/may have already started to write a coda to this story that explores many of the same themes, just a little later on in their lives. It will just be a (probably) long one-shot, but please keep your eyes peeled for it.
> 
> If you want to follow me on tumblr i'm darknessaroundus, over there too. I'm planning to put together a list of the stories that influenced this one. But it will have to be in a couple days, because right now I'm on vacation (so expect comment responses to be no sooner than Thursday).


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